Insurance built around your dental practice

From a first office to a multi-location group

The right program depends on how your practice is built. An associate buying a four-chair office, a periodontist with two locations and a lab running milling machines overnight each start from a different place.

Solo & independent practicesOne owner-dentist, one office and the practice as the biggest asset you own. Group practicesPartners and associates sharing a schedule, a staff and an entity. Specialty practicesOrthodontics, periodontics, endodontics, oral surgery, implants and pediatric care. Dental groups & DSOsSeveral offices under one roof of management and one insurance program. Dental labsCrowns, bridges and appliances made to a dentist's prescription, with the equipment to match.

Clinical risk and business risk live on different policies

Your malpractice policy is written for one thing: claims that your treatment harmed a patient. It isn't built to pay for a flooded sterilization room, a stolen laptop full of charts or a hygienist's wrist surgery. Those belong to the practice package.

The reverse is just as true. A general liability policy on a dental office usually carries a professional services exclusion, so a claim about a crown or an extraction goes to the malpractice policy, not the GL. A slip on the waiting-room mat goes the other way.

When two policies are bought at different times, from different people, for different reasons, nobody checks where one ends and the next begins. That is the work we do. Our licensed team lays your malpractice policy next to the practice coverage and reads them together:

• Who is insured. The entity, each dentist, your hygienists and assistants, and anyone who covers for you while you're away.
• When each policy responds. Claims-made dates, retroactive dates and what happens to past treatment if you switch, sell or retire.
• What the building and equipment are really worth today, not what they were worth when the lease was signed.
• What your landlord and lender require, in writing, so a certificate request never becomes a scramble.

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The gaps we look for first

Most dental practices we talk with are insured. Few are insured in a way that matches how the practice runs today. These are the gaps that show up again and again.

No plan for the tail

A claims-made malpractice policy covers claims made while it's in force, for treatment after its retroactive date. When you change carriers, leave a group or sell, the past treatment needs a home: an extended reporting period (tail) from the old policy or prior-acts coverage on the new one. Deciding that at the closing table is expensive. Deciding it a year ahead is usually not. How claims-made, occurrence and tail coverage work

Imaging and build-out values set years ago

A practice that added a CBCT unit, an intraoral scanner and two operatories since its last renewal often still carries the equipment limit it started with. After a fire, the policy pays up to that limit, and the difference comes out of the practice. Tenant improvements are a second blind spot: many leases make you responsible for the build-out you paid for.

Breach costs assumed away

Practice-management software vendors protect their own systems, not your office network or your front-desk inbox. When a breach starts on your side, the forensic work, the patient letters and the downtime usually land on the practice. Federal rules give a practice 60 calendar days at most from discovering a breach to notify the affected patients, and they expect it sooner if possible.

Front-office money with no crime coverage

Example scenario: a long-time billing coordinator quietly posts cash co-pays as insurance adjustments for three years. The owner finds it during a practice valuation. A general liability policy won't respond to that loss, because it covers harm to others, not theft of your own money. Employee theft coverage is the policy written for it. Employee theft coverage

Insurance that grows with the practice

A dental career moves in stages, and each one changes what you need. We plan the program around the next stage, not just the current renewal.

• Associate to owner. Your first malpractice policy as an owner, entity coverage for the practice and a decision about your old policy's tail. The insurance checklist for buying a practice
• Opening from scratch. Build-out, equipment financing, a lease with insurance clauses and the first hires, in the right order. Insurance for a dental start-up
• Adding chairs and technology. Equipment limits, breakdown coverage and cyber that keep pace with what's in the operatories.
• Your tenth employee. Workers' comp, employment practices liability and a closer look at who handles the money.
• A second office, or a partner. Shared limits, separate locations on one schedule, and buy-in and exit terms that protect everyone. Coverage for multi-location groups
• Selling or retiring. Tail coverage, the last renewal and a clean handoff to the buyer.

Whatever stage you're in, our licensed team starts with the same question: what would hurt this practice most if it happened next month? The program follows from that answer.

What our team asks before we compare anything

A good comparison starts with the right facts. These are the questions a licensed agent on our team works through with you, and why each one matters.

How is the practice organized?

A professional corporation, an LLC, a partnership or a sole owner. The answer decides whether the entity needs its own malpractice coverage, whose name goes on the property policy and how limits are shared between dentists. If a management company sits beside the clinical entity, each needs its own business coverage.

Which procedures do you perform, and how often?

Malpractice underwriters price by procedure mix. A general practice placing a handful of implants a year is rated differently from one where implants and extractions fill half the schedule. Knowing the mix up front avoids a quote that changes at underwriting.

What's in the operatories today?

Chairs, imaging units, scanners, milling equipment and sterilization gear, with rough replacement costs. We also ask what the lease says about who insures the build-out, because tenant improvements are often the largest number on the property schedule.

What does your current malpractice policy look like?

Claims-made or occurrence, the retroactive date, the limits and the renewal date. If you're switching, the retro date tells us whether prior-acts coverage on a new policy can replace buying a tail from the old one.

Where does patient data live?

On a server in the back office, in the cloud or both, and who can reach it from home. That shapes the cyber options worth comparing and the questions an underwriter will ask about backups and email security.

Who handles the money?

How deposits are reconciled, who posts adjustments and write-offs, and whether one person does all of it. Those answers drive the employee theft limit we suggest.

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The carriers behind your practice package

As an independent agency, we compare options from more than 12 carriers. Each carrier we work with is rated A- (Excellent) or better by AM Best. Which carriers fit depends on your state, your coverage needs and how the practice is set up. Our carriers

For property, liability, cyber and workers' comp, carriers we work with include:

Carrier names and logos are trademarks of their respective owners. Not all carriers write in every state.