THE RELAXED DENTIST
Dr Mark Hassed.
“I spent the first few years of my career doing clinical courses. None of them changed my practice. Then I took a communication course…”
“My practice doubled.
Then doubled again.
Then doubled again.”
Years practicing
35+
2,000+
20,000+
Dentists trained
Crowns completed
I graduated from the University of Melbourne in 1980 and spent the next three and a half decades doing what most dentists do — trying to get better at dentistry. I built two very different practices: a high-volume, family-oriented clinic in Endeavour Hills and a state-of-the-art adult restorative practice in Canterbury.
Between them, those two practices allowed me to discover what actually works and what doesn't. My practices became laboratories where I constantly tested new ideas, rejecting those that didn’t work and incorporating those that did into my playbook.
Early in my career I was frustrated by a gap I couldn't overcome. I knew how to do dentistry. My clinical skills were solid and getting better all the time. But patients kept declining treatment, opting for compromises, or simply disappearing to the dentist down the street. I kept enrolling in technical courses, assuming the answer was more clinical knowledge. It wasn't.
The turning point came when I took my first communication course. At that time there were no dental communication courses in Australia so I regularly travelled to the USA. I also took general sales courses. People I took the courses with used to find it funny — a dentist sitting in a room full of real estate or car or insurance salesmen.
The results were immediate and profound. Patients who had previously said “I’ll think about it” started saying “Yes”. Complex cases I'd hesitated to present were suddenly being accepted. That was the time when the trajectory of my career took off.
Years went by. 20,000 crowns went by.
After selling my final practice, I took a role consulting for a corporate dental group. My job was to visit practices of underperforming dentists and figure out why they were struggling. I used to sit in the corner of the operatory watching these dentists work with their patients.
The problem got to be predictable. The downfall was very rarely clinical skill, equipment, or location. The problem was almost always communication.
That insight was the spark for me to create The Art of Case Acceptance. I ran that seminar for the first time in Sydney in 2012 to an audience of 21 dentists. Since then I’ve trained more than 2,000 dentists and teams across Australia, New Zealand, and beyond through live seminars, online courses, and in-office training.
I teach what I know works because I've tested it thousands of times at the chair, not because it looks good in a framework or reads well in a textbook. My approach to case acceptance is simple, pressure-free, and feels comfortable for both the dentist and the patient.
After running the case acceptance seminars for a few years I came to realise that I had another competence that could help dentists — efficiency. My approach to efficiency is built on the same principle: find what actually moves the needle and strip everything else away.
The 30-minute crown preparation is an iconic example of this. I love the constant seeking after improvement of saving 30 seconds here or there. The best time I ever achieved for a crown preparation was 14 minutes from when the patient sat down to when they sat up, job done, and rinsed out.
That led on to me developing The Art of Efficient Dentistry which I think is such a beautiful pairing with case acceptance. Get those two things right and you are made.
I run The Relaxed Dentist because I love the work.
The teaching, the interaction, the travel, and the occasional privilege of watching a dentist realise that the practice they always wanted is actually within reach are all fascinating to me.
How much longer will it go on? Who knows but it is a fun journey.
