He Built 80 Dental Practices Without Taking Away Autonomy | Lane Theriault, BOAC #56

In this episode of The Business of a Clinic, Jared speaks with Lane Theriault, CEO of Independence Dental. Lane started his career as an investment banker at Citigroup before moving into dental consolidation. After helping launch 123Dentist in Canada, he moved to the U.S. to build Independence Dental, which has grown from 8 practices at the end of 2020 to around 80 practices today. The conversation explores how Independence Dental thinks about scaling differently from a traditional DSO. Instead of forcing every clinic into one rigid playbook, Lane describes a supported autonomy model where successful practices keep control of their clinical and business identity while gaining access to group-level support. Jared and Lane discuss what dentists actually want after acquisition, including recruiting support, marketing accountability, revenue cycle management, payroll, procurement, and operational infrastructure. They also go deep on why marketing alone does not fix growth if the practice has a “leaky bucket” at the point of call handling, conversion, diary capacity, and patient retention. Lane also shares how Independence Dental is approaching AI. Rather than treating AI as a single product or outsourcing everything to vendors, the group is building an internal culture of AI, where people closest to the operational problem can build tools for their own workflows. They discuss custom apps, knowledge bases, coding agents, PHI, BAAs, AI receptionists, patient trust, and why transparency matters when patients interact with AI. The episode closes with Lane’s view on what will and will not change in dentistry. Customer service, relationships, and trust will remain central. But labour shortages and automation may change how care is delivered, including the possibility of robots completing tasks like crowns in the future. Chapters 0:00 Opening1:12 Lane Theriault’s background 2:00 From Citigroup to dental consolidation 3:25 Growing Independence Dental from 8 to 80 practices 4:00 Supported autonomy vs the traditional DSO playbook 6:20 What dental owners get after joining the group 8:00 Recruiting in a difficult dental labour market 9:10 Marketing accountability after acquisition 11:25 Building consensus with partner practices 13:20 Why marketing spend leaks at patient handling 14:10 The leaky bucket problem 15:15 Calendar capacity, conversion, and new patients 16:20 The future of Independence Dental 18:20 Technology, operational excellence, and AI 19:00 Creating a culture of AI inside the business 20:40 Buy vs build and where automation should start 23:25 Internal knowledge bases and data controls 24:40 Revenue cycle management and automation 25:40 AI receptionists and patient trust 27:00 Is SaaS dead or just changing? 30:00 Where AI actually delivers value 33:40 Patient recall and the “then what?” problem 35:10 How to begin an AI transformation 38:00 PHI, compliance, BAAs, and security 39:40 Building organisational context for AI 41:20 Lane’s four steps for AI transformation 42:40 The future of dentistry 43:15 What will not change: service, relationships, and trust 44:00 Dental robots and the future of care 44:40 Closing thoughts The Business of a Clinic explores how private healthcare clinics can grow by improving patient relationships, patient engagement, clinic operations, retention, follow-up, commercial systems, and the overall patient experience.