It could be said Orange County cares about the face.
With University of California-Irvine work, both academic and medical, and a vibrant startup culture in eye care, the county has long been known as an ophthalmology hub—a salient fact underscored recently by a $63 billion bid for longtime OC looker Allergan PLC (see related story, page 1).
Anyone driving the Newport Coast will note a preponderance of aesthetics medicine—plastic surgeons prominent, see also Allergan, again—and inland into Irvine will find more startups in that space, as the venture capitalists and private equity guys say.
Finally, consider teeth.
The Business Journal’s directory of dental health maintenance and preferred provider organizations is home to more than a dozen entries from the massive—Delta Dental of California—to what could nearly qualify as a startup by its size, Dental Health Services in Long Beach.
The directory doesn’t rank dental HMOs and PPOs; companies are listed alphabetically.
Provisions
Combined, the companies have 2 million OC enrollees, Business Journal research shows, about the same as last year.
Delta is the county’s largest with about 40% of that total. It’s also among the larger dental insurers nationally: its website says it offers services—including vision plans—to one of every three Americans.
Our data shows MetLife Inc. has about 240,000 members in OC.
At the other end of the spectrum, several directory members hover around 10,000 enrollees—what would constitute a slow day for Delta Dental and MetLife services countywide:
• Dental Health Services shows 6,800 enrollees, about the same as last year.
• Premier Access insures about 12,900—a 12% jump for the provider.
• Smile Brands in Irvine has 13,000 local dental enrollees.
Smile is primarily a dental services organization, providing all operations for more than 400 dentist offices in almost 20 states. It’s owned by Bay Area-based private equity investor Gryphon and led by Chief Executive Steve Bilt.
Low-to-mid-range providers include United Concordia Dental with 34,000 local clients—up 31%—and Ameritas Group Dental, with a Costa Mesa office and about 42,000 enrollees.
United Concordia shows 155,000 local enrollees and nearly 12 million nationwide.
Cigna, with a significant presence in Irvine, has about 172,000 local dental patients.
Services
MetLife on its website offers a slew of information it dubs a “Dental Library” and covering oral and overall health; family and disease issues; treatment, insurance and other tools.
It bandies about the word “thrive” a bit, a common term in healthcare circles—it’s also a favorite of medical HMO Kaiser Permanente (see story page 26 and list page 30).
MetLife applies it to having healthy teeth.
Aetna Dental’s website notes “access to dental services” isn’t guaranteed and encourages members to check costs and plans to know for sure.
Many of Aetna’s services are provided to lower-income patients through government-sponsored insurance.
