The private-equity-fuelled roll-up in fields such as dentistry, optometry and veterinary medicine is beginning to transform these practices, which are traditionally owner-operated
Independent health care professionals are expressing concern that their professions’ regulators are not keeping pace with large corporate players that are quietly buying up medical practices.in fields such as dentistry, optometry and veterinary medicine is beginning to transform these practices, which are traditionally owner-operated. And it is raising questions about the influence corporate head offices could exert on pricing and quality of care.
The Ontario Veterinary College has been working to clarify its directorship requirements. The college introduced new regulations, effective July 1, that formalize the role of facility director at clinics and require the director – who must be a licensed veterinarian – to have a more hands-on role in operations.
In 2018, the disciplinary tribunal of the College of Dental Surgeons of Alberta fined a dentist more than $680,000 for working with Dentalcorp, the largest chain of dental clinics in Canada, to buy practices in the province. In an interview, Dentalcorp president Guy Amini declined to say whether the company had later compensated the dentist for the fine.
Mr. Amini added that Dentalcorp drafted many infection-control policies early in the pandemic that it shared with provincial colleges, some of which in turn shared the documents with their members. Kal Khaled, a dentist who co-owns Southdown Dental in Mississauga, and who leads the independent advocacy group the Ontario Alliance of Dentists, said there is a consumer-protection argument to be made that corporate clinics should have to disclose their ownership to the public.
Dino dell’Orta, an audiologist and co-owner of the Hearing Clinic in Barrie, Ont., said that many corporate-owned chains in his field are owned by companies that also manufacture hearing aids, opening up the risk that a patient could be prescribed that company’s products, even when a competitor’s hearing aids might be a better fit.“I’m still moving across all the manufacturers,” he said. “I don’t represent them.
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