20 years at Sale Dental Spa

Sale Dental Spa opened in 2005. This year the practice turned 20, which seemed worth marking properly rather than letting it go past unmentioned.

How it started

Dr Aisha Ahmed founded the practice on Washway Road in 2005. It began as a small surgery with a small team. Twenty years on there are four surgeries, a full clinical and support team, and a practice that has grown mostly by word of mouth rather than by advertising.

That is not modesty for its own sake. It matters to how the place runs. A practice that grows because patients recommend it has to keep the people it already has happy, which is a different set of priorities from a practice built on winning new ones.

Come as a patient, stay as a friend

That line has been ours for most of the twenty years and it is not something we came up with for an anniversary. It describes what we notice most about working here.

People move out of the area and still drive back for their appointments. Some of the families on our books have been coming for many years. Someone arrives for an examination and spends the first few minutes at reception catching up about a holiday before anyone mentions teeth.

Dentistry is a clinical job and we take the clinical part seriously. But twenty years in one building is also twenty years of the same conversations with the same families, and that is the part the line is about.

What has changed

A great deal, technically. Digital scanning has replaced most impression trays, which most patients are glad about. Clear aligners have gone from a novelty to a routine option for adults who want their teeth straightened without anyone noticing. Composite materials have improved to the point where a lot of work that once needed a crown can now be done more conservatively.

The general direction of all of it has been towards keeping more of your own tooth. Twenty years ago a fair amount of cosmetic dentistry meant reducing healthy teeth to fit something over them. Much less of it does now, and that is a genuine improvement rather than a marketing one.

What has not

Being told what is actually going on in your mouth, in ordinary language. Being given the options with the costs attached, including the option of doing nothing for now. Not being sold something you did not come in about.

We would rather tell you that a tooth needs watching than treat it today because you happen to be in the chair. That has been the approach since 2005 and it is not changing.

Twenty years on

An anniversary is mostly a good excuse to say thank you, so, thank you. To the patients who have stayed, to the ones who sent their friends and families to us, and to the team, several of whom have been here long enough to remember what the waiting room used to look like.

If you have been meaning to sort something out and have not got round to it, a Smile Design consultation is free and is a conversation rather than an examination. A new patient examination is £35. You can book online at sale-dental-care.portal.dental or call us on 0161 969 7464. We are at 77 Washway Road, Sale, Manchester M33 7TQ, where we have always been.