The Educational Supervisors: Dipali, along with her husband, owns and manages 4 dental practices in Cambridgeshire. She has been an ES for over 10 years and is passionate about nurturing the talent of new dentists. Her clinical strengths lie in restorative dentistry and extractions, and she has recently completed the Chris Orr advanced restorative course as well as non-surgical facial aesthetics. Her non-clinical strengths lie in complaints management, staff recruitment and training. Outside of dentistry she is mother to three young girls and is passionate about interior design. She understands the power of social media in both a professional and personal context and believes that it is quickly becoming a huge part of the future of dentistry. Her and her husband are in the habit of supporting the progress of previous FDs to become super-associates - talented, high-grossing individuals who are doing innovative and exciting dentistry. She is on-site 2-3 days of the week and is not always seeing patients, so she uses those days to schedule joint procedures with the FD like crown preps where she can sit chairside for an hour and assist them, so they are not left alone.
Marzena is a general practitioner with a special interest in implants and cosmetic dentistry -she is also fantastic at surgical extractions. She works 5 days a week and will be on call to help the FD at any time, often working through her lunch and after-hours happily. She has been at the practice for over 15 years.
The Practice: We have recently moved premises to a new high street location, and have 9 brand new surgeries. The practice has been designed by Dipali personally, and is modern and luxurious in its appearance, much like the dentistry it provides. There are at least 4-5 other dentists working everyday, aside from the FD, so lots of help on hand. We have a team of 3 hygienists, and a large team of support staff fro nurses to reception and the manager to help the FD every stage of the way.
The team has a varied skill mix, in terms of their strengths, and we have team members that do implants, short-term orthodontics, extremely impressive cosmetic work and surgical extractions. Dipali herself also does facial aesthetics.
he FDs working hours are 9am to 5pm every day except Tuesday when they are usually on a scheme training day. When there is no training day, the FD has the Tuesday off and is not scheduled to work.
The Area: March is a market town and a hub of activity amongst the surrounding towns. It has easy train links into Cambridge, Peterborough, London and Birmingham, and the station is a short walk or car journey from the Practice. A lot of our previous FDs have chosen to move into town to ease the daily commute, and accommodation is relatively cheap compared to the bigger cities and very easy to find. Dipali herself lived in March until very recently and has now moved to Cambridge and the daily commute is 50 minutes by car. There is lots of free parking outside the surgery. Previous FDs have also chosen to live with other FDs from the area in a flat-share and commute in.
Our patients are made up of the local community mainly, and the practice has been part of that community for over 30 years. We see all kinds of patients from families to the elderly and everything in between. They are of mixed need, and being the only NHS practice in a large radius, we are never short of patients and have never before struggled to help the FD meet all their clinical quotas and get plenty of experience in every area of dentistry.
Other Points of Interest: We have all the latest equipment and materials on site including a computerised record keeping system, in-surgery digital x-rays, an OPG, 2 rotary endo systems, surgical equipment and a digital intra-oral scanner, all available for the FD to use from the outset. We want to be able to teach you not just to have a solid foundation of basic clinical skills but also learn how to do things in this rapidly developing world of dentistry by embracing new techniques, materials and ideas. By the end of the year our aim is for you to be able to be so competent and functional that you could walk into any associate job with confidence, possibly even one within our own practices - many of our previous FDs have chosen to stay on with us because of the happy and supportive working environment we provide.
Above all we are an extremely fun practice, we have each other's backs at work - help out to see a patient if they are running late or need help with a procedure. We socialise quite frequently as a practice and a lot of the team are also friendly outside of work. Despite our combined experience being extensive, we are a young team with lots of energy, a good work ethic and a great sense of humour. We have great banter everyday, we have lunch together as a team and we love what we do!
CHECK OUT OUR INSTA PROFILE: @marchdentalsurgery