Louisville, Ky.-based Mortenson Dental Partners is using a multifaceted approach to grow and expand its network in 2025.
The DSO recently acquired four offices previously supported by West 10th Dental Group in Indianapolis, bringing its network up to 144 dental practices in nine states.
Mortenson Dental Partners CEO Bill Becknell recently spoke with Becker’s to discuss the company’s goals for this year.
Editor’s note: These responses were lightly edited for length and clarity.
Question: How would you describe Mortenson Dental Partners’ growth over the last few years?
Bill Becknell: Since the pandemic, we’ve been growing in a three-tiered approach. Initially, we started with organic [growth.] We’re trying to expand in the practices that had existing capacity along with an adjacent revenue cycle management strategy to grow our reimbursements. We’re pretty effective with both of those. We were running about 10% growth for the years after the pandemic. We’ve also moved more recently into a practice expansion mode. So we’re looking at practices in which the team and the patient base are ready to expand, and then moving into adjacent real estate to the left or the right of our current facility, expanding into that and adding more operatories and more team members to care for patients. Also, we recently did an acquisition of the West 10th Dental Group to add to our business, and we’re looking to do more of those in the future.
Q: How has MDP worked to increase reimbursements for providers?
BB: We’re just trying to work with our payers and look at what our reimbursement rates are with each of them, and then work on the bottom quartile to push those reimbursement rates up. Of course, we are making strategic decisions about what payers we will accept and which ones we won’t based on that, which is a bit of a challenge, and sometimes you have to make those decisions. Payers have been a little slow to keep up with some of the cost pressures in the market, which has forced dental practices to make some decisions about who they accept.
Q: Is it easier to have those conversations with payers as a DSO versus a dental practice?
BB: Yes, absolutely. As we acquire groups and practices, we see a significant difference in what we’ve been able to do on revenue cycle and payer contracts versus the solo provider.
Q: What do you consider to be the top factors driving your company’s growth?
BB: The first is really rock solid patient care. Our group gives a great patient experience. Our net promoter score runs in the mid 90s, and that creates a very strong flow of patients and reappointment rate. As that grows, these individuals share with their friends, and then you end up with more new patients, so a top driver has been the excellent patient care that our supported doctors and practices that allows them to continue to grow their patient base. We have also really seen a lot of interest in other groups and practices interested in joining us because we are not a DSO backed by private equity. We are completely owned by our doctors and team members, and we’re seeing a lot of practices and small regional groups that are looking to partner with a non private equity-backed, strategic DSO.
Q: What made West 10th Dental Group a good fit for a partnership?
BB: For us, it really is always about alignment in our culture, and as we compared our mission and values to the mission and values of West 10th, they were very similar, not only in print, but in practice. We have an existing footprint in Indianapolis, so adding this into the family of care made a whole lot of business sense as well. So, it was a combination of factors that really made it a great opportunity for both West 10th and for us.
Q: What goals does the company have in terms of organic and inorganic growth?
BB: On the organic side, we’re continuing to expand some practices into the existing facilities they have. We have a very comprehensive continuing education program that allows our doctors to expand their skill sets through a very structured and supported approach. We’ve seen a lot of benefits from that. Also, we continue with our revenue cycle management improvements and driving reimbursements for our supported providers with our payers. We also spent a record amount of capital in 2024 on expansions, so that’s giving us a lot of new operatories to move into, and add teams to support communities that we’re already in. We have a couple more acquisitions on the horizon for us this year, so we will do a few more before this year is up as well.
Q: How does MDP stand out from other DSOs in the field?
BB: First, is our ownership structure. We are 100% owned by our doctors and our team members. Our doctors are direct investors. They choose to invest and participate in the ownership and invest their own cash. Then, all employees, including doctors, hygienists, business assistants, practice managers and support team members, are part of an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP). So, everyone in the company who provides support to the practices or are in the practices that provide care to our patients have ownership in the company, and that is a really powerful thing.
The other thing I would add is the MDP support system. We have a very comprehensive support platform. I know a lot of DSOs talk about this, and some do deliver, but we really do remove a lot of the administrative burden of running a practice so they truly can focus on patient care. Our support system definitely makes us unique. Lastly, doctor leadership. Our board of directors is a nine-member board. Seven of those are doctors. Many of those are practicing doctors. We have also built an organization designed to support and develop our doctors to make sure they can care for patients, and so they can meet the lifestyle goals they have. That’s really the purpose we run our organization around, and it does make us quite a bit different. Our doctor turnover has been right at 10% the last two years. From what I hear from most DSOs, that’s really low.
Q: What is your outlook for the DSO field this year?
BB: I think 2025 is going to be an interesting year for sure. We’ve already experienced a lot of headwinds. We’ve had several record weather events, specifically in many of our markets. We’ve also had a 15-year-high flu season. We’ve seen a lot of cancellations and a lot of sicknesses. Interest rates are obviously holding for a little while longer. We see that being a factor in not declining as fast as we were thinking a year ago. I think we still see some staffing challenges for sure.
We also see a lot of opportunities for upside. Revenue cycle management continues to bear fruit. Our investments and acquisitions are going well. Our supported doctors and teams are doing a phenomenal job caring for patients. Some strategic scheduling and treatment planning efforts we have internally to support our practices to make sure we can work through those cancelations and scheduling opportunities have been very effective, and we really see those helping us grow the business. But also for 2025 are a fair amount of uncertainties that really are unclear how they might shake out, and I think that’s true for almost every business right now. That could be anything from tariffs to tax laws to Medicaid changes, fluoridation, and obviously some economic impacts from those changes, such as the possibility of inflation. Those are things we’re definitely keeping our eye on and could certainly impact the year in a pretty significant way.