Dentex

Reimagining group dentistry. Making lives better.

If you weren’t already aware, Portman Dental Care and Dentex Health merged in April 2023 to form one of the most prominent providers of privately focused dental care in UK and Ireland. This week, with the reveal of the new name and brand for the business – PortmanDentex – they’ve shared their mission to reimagine group dentistry and wellness enabling happier and healthier futures for patients, clinicians and colleagues.

A smile. For life.

We know that good dental care matters. It’s a vital part of a healthier, happier life – and it matters to people of all ages. Across the UK and Ireland, patients rely on highly experienced clinicians who are empowered to do their best work. At PortmanDentex our practices are integral parts of their local communities, and our role is to support our clinicians and practice teams to deliver the best care possible to their patients – every day.

Today we support over 370 practices, with more than 2,400 passionate clinicians and 4,500 dedicated practice colleagues providing dental care for around 1.5 million patients every year. We are passionate about creating better ways to support our network of clinicians in delivering excellent care to our patients and we have the scale and commitment to make a lasting positive difference to the world of dentistry.

“We’re excited to share with you our new brand – marking the next step in our exciting journey as PortmanDentex… We now have a huge opportunity to provide best in class care to our patients, an inspiring place to work for both our clinicians and colleagues and a sustainable platform with which to achieve this.” Julie Ross CEO UK & Ireland

For every practice. And every smile.

The key is partnership. We know that every community and every patient is unique. As a dental group we strive to balance celebrating the individuality of our clinicians and practices, while using the benefits of our scale and commitment to deliver the best care possible for all of our patients.

In all of our work, we aim to deliver for our patients, our colleagues and our clinicians. That means supporting our high-performing practices with continual curiosity about what comes next,  constantly imagining new possibilities and harnessing technology to innovate and improve the way we do things.

Dental health. Brighter futures.

We’re delighted to reveal our new identity. It’s based on positive partnerships – the power of working together to provide dental care that enables better health and happiness across lifetimes. Please watch our new film – we hope you enjoy it as much as we do.

We’d love for you to support us, so please do follow us on LinkedIn [insert handle] – and keep up-to- date with what we’re up to and our future plans.

 

For more information please visit: portmandentex.com

Or follow Portman Dentex on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/portmandentex/

Dentex partners with Queensway Group in ‘deal of the year’

Believed to be the largest independent dental business transaction in the UK in recent years, specialist business property adviser, Christie & Co, has announced a landmark partnership between North East-based dental business, Queensway Group and Dentex.

Queensway Group has meticulously expanded and grown since being founded in 1994 when Paul Averley, a graduate dentist from Newcastle University, set up his first practice in Billingham. Today, Paul is partnered alongside esteemed sector leaders in the profession – Guy Deeming, Richard Elliott, Ian Lane, Paul Howlett, William Carter, Uzma Olbrich, Rob Banks, and Matthew Garnett.

Now a dominant force in UK dentistry, with 40 surgeries across eight locations in the North East of England, Queensway is a sophisticated, multifaceted business operation comprising private dental and skin services with private and NHS specialist oral surgery and orthodontics together with a highly specified full-service digital laboratory.

The Queensway Partners engaged Christie & Co to find a strategic investment partner to accelerate the growth of the business, with the expansion of the group’s footprint, capabilities, and ongoing service provision to patients, clinicians, and colleagues – a partnership with dental corporate, Dentex, has supported this objective.

Paul Averley, Managing Partner at Queensway Group, comments, “We are delighted to be entering into partnership with Dentex and look forward to this new and exciting chapter in the life of Queensway Dental. Working with Dentex will secure the future and longevity of the Queensway brand and will provide stability for our amazing team and wonderful patients. This business relationship will create some excellent opportunities for the Queensway business and our people, and enable us to grow and develop, whilst continuing to provide high standards of clinical care for our patients.”

Oliver Snowden, Director of Partnerships & Acquisitions at Dentex, comments, “In my 10-plus years in the dental sector, I have seen a number of successful independent dental groups, but the Queensway Partnership is something truly unique. The vision of the owners to build such a diverse and forward-thinking business is remarkable. It was clear from our first meeting that the business has a ‘patient first’ approach to dentistry and a culture that allows its clinicians and colleagues to thrive in a state-of-the-art setting. After a competitive sales process led expertly by the Christie & Co team, I was delighted that the Queensway Partners chose to partner with Dentex. We now look forward to getting to know the wider team and supporting the business with its exciting growth plans.”

Paul Graham, Head of Dental at Christie & Co, comments, “Queensway Group, incorporating dental, orthodontics, skin clinic, and laboratory – this cluster of practices rooted from humble foundations in the North East of England – is, by far, one of the most impressive dental organisations that we’ve seen in the UK. This was, of course, the intent of the laser-focused Partners, their various management teams, and the whole Queensway infrastructure, to be the best at what they do and offer.

“Dentistry is currently one of the post-pandemic growth sectors, and so, when we launched the sale process, we knew lots of interest would prevail – between private equity (PE) houses and existing trade buyers, we had upwards of 30 parties vying for the opportunity. The landscape then suddenly changed with the UK having to deal with the economic and geopolitical challenges that were orbiting. However, testament to the strength of Queensway, the competitive and strategic process that we conducted, and of course with Dentex as their new partner, the outcome delivered did not faulter. This landmark transaction contradicts some of the negative rhetoric around M&A activity in the sector and underpins the strength and resilience of the UK dental market, with demand still strong for quality dental businesses which are accurately priced.”

The Queensway Group and Dentex transaction was completed for an undisclosed price.

The Queensway Partners were advised in respect of the transaction by Christie & Co’s agency and consultancy teams, as well as Inspire Financial Management, and Knights plc as legal advisors. Dentex was advised by PwC, and legal advisors Charles Russell Speechlys.

Philips and Dentex join forces to upskill and empower Dental Hygienists and Therapists

Philips and Dentex have embarked on an initiative to help upskill the Dental Hygienists and Therapists who work for the 85 dental practices within the Dentex Group – the co-ownership dental group which has a reputation for increasing practice turnovers. 

Dr Rahul Doshi explains: “I joined Dentex in 2017 and my practice was one of the first acquisitions. I have since become Clinical Director for the group, focusing on mentoring and training for all clinical staff. We have quickly grown to 85 member practices, with a goal of adding to this to reach 100 by the end of the year. I was attracted by the partnership business model Dentex offers, because it meant that nobody would try to unnecessarily alter the way I was running my practice. As Principal dentists, after years of fine tuning our practices we naturally like it that way, so any organisation which wanted to come in and make changes, or curb my hard-won independence would not be of any interest to me. Many of my peers appear to feel the same way, as the growing numbers signing up to join Dentex attest.

Dentex offers practice owners support whilst respecting clinical freedom. That means that you can still choose the dental materials, dental laboratories and equipment you wish to use, you can retain your own branding and style of dentistry you enjoy, as well as the way you have set up all your appointments. That is not the purpose of the organisation.  Affiliating one’s practice with Dentex is all about achieving significant growth. The organisation supports practices with the elements which may be harder to master, such as marketing, compliance, operations and legal issues. This allows owners to relinquish some of the more onerous burdens of practising such as compliance, regulations and administration, freeing them up to focus on their clinical work and expanding their skillsets, whether that is to develop a network of practices, or spend more time with patients focusing on clinical work. We have had dentists who considered retiring and who are still running their practices because Dentex has considerably helped shift the scales in their work life balance.

During the pandemic, Dentex also offered additional guidance and support to members by providing education and ways to upskill with a series of webinars and resources to help our practices resume working faster and more effectively. However, there have been downsides to the pandemic for our practices too and there is a feeling that many Hygienists and Therapists may have been left behind in all this. So we wanted to help all team members to have similarly attractive opportunities to feel supported and to grow. To facilitate this, we are working with Philips Oral Healthcare on initiatives to help practices’ team members to expand their horizons and enhance their skills. Dentex doesn’t tell practice owners how they should run their teams, however the organisation is there to support and help with their practice growth.

We want to ignite the passion in all clinicians and team members equally by delivering quality education, mentoring and training, and as part of this we are partnering Philips to help us with this initiative. Philips is aligned to the values Dentex has of delivering excellence in education and shares our ethos of integrity, ethics, passion and collaboration, and that’s an exciting collaboration”.

Professional Marketing Manager for Philips Mel Pomphrett explains that “This project will mean that all the Dentex practices’ can avail themselves of Philips professional educators’ training for their Hygienists and Therapists to undertake Zoom chairside and home tooth whitening treatments. This will give them the requisite clinical proficiency, product knowledge and even the language to use, to ensure they have the confidence to treat and a fulfilling new set of skills to add to their scope of practice.”

Dr Doshi concludes: “Clinical staff who have greater access to training and development, often find new avenues to pursue, or that the path to special interest becomes clearer. Likewise support staff find their roles enhanced giving them greater responsibilities and allow them to grow into wider, more fulfilling jobs.

Dentex is proud to have had really positive results where practice turnovers are concerned and we are looking forward to continuing in that direction supporting more practice owners and their teams as a result of this initiative and others we are currently planning.”

For more information about Dentex, visit https://www.dentexhealth.co.uk/

For more information about Philips Zoom Whitening visit https://www.philips.co.uk/c-m-pe/dental-professionals