Dental Leaders Podcast

Bizhan Shokouhi didn't set out to be an oral surgeon, or even to specialise at all. He joins Payman as a specialist oral surgeon and implantologist working across private practice and Guy's Hospital, and teaching on the Bristol MSc in Implants, having spent his first year qualified convinced he'd end up a restorative dentist. He talks openly about the one thing he tells every trainee before they touch an implant, which has nothing to do with surgery and everything to do with communication, and about a denture case that took twenty-odd visits over eighteen months before he admitted defeat and referred it on. There's a genuinely reflective stretch on ambition too: Bizhan's own answer to whether he'd want his own practice is a flat no, and his reasoning, built around contentment rather than potential, runs against almost everything you'd expect from someone this good at his job. Along the way, there's proper technical detail on soft tissue management, bone grafting, and why the first five minutes of a surgery matter more than anything that happens with a suture. And by the end, Payman more or less names the episode for him: was it worth it? In This Episode 00:00:50 – Introduction 00:01:35 – A typical working week 00:04:20 – Becoming excellent 00:09:28 – Work-life balance 00:14:36 – Getting into implantology 00:21:00 – Communicating with patients 00:30:39 – Digital planning and AI 00:36:52 – Robots and the future 00:54:52 – Blackbox thinking 01:02:48 – Soft tissue lessons 01:05:11 – Building an Instagram following 01:12:04 – Mentors in implantology 01:14:44 – Why no practice of his own 01:19:59 – Best lecture: Martin Kelleher 01:22:36 – Fantasy dinner party About Bizhan Shokouhi Bizhan Shokouhi is a specialist oral surgeon and implantologist working in private practice and at Guy's Hospital, and a tutor on the Bristol MSc in Implants. He is known for his educational Instagram content on oral surgery and soft tissue management, and previously trained in restorative dentistry and maxillofacial surgery before specialising.

Anita Pradan pulled her car onto the hard shoulder of the motorway one day, cried, took her laptop out of the boot, and typed her resignation. She joins Payman as founder of Phoenix Dental Academy, having spent years running herself into the ground managing someone else's education business before deciding to build her own. She talks openly about the exam that took her five years longer than expected, the practice interview where a principal offered her £1,500 a month and shouted at her for turning it down, and the gap between what overseas dentists post on Instagram and what they're actually going through once they arrive in the UK. There's a properly moving thread here about her father too, a maxillofacial surgeon who treated Nepal's royal family, and what it took for Anita to build something that was hers rather than his. Along the way, Anita gets specific about which countries produce the best-prepared dentists, why crown preps are the one part of the ORE exam that actually matters, and the impression material disaster in her very first week that she still uses to teach students today. In This Episode 00:01:05 – Introduction 00:01:30 – What the ORE involves 00:07:05 – Therapist-led routes into the GDC 00:10:55 – Exploitation and bad contracts 00:16:55 – Social media versus reality 00:19:30 – Building Phoenix Dental Academy 00:24:35 – Leaving a toxic workplace 00:32:15 – Growing up in her father's shadow 00:38:15 – Teaching hands-on courses 00:45:00 – The gap between passing and practising 00:52:25 – Ambition without a partner 00:57:20 – A typical week 00:59:00 – Which countries produce the best dentists 01:10:45 – Blackbox thinking 01:22:50 – Fantasy dinner party About Anita Pradan Anita Pradan is a Nepalese, Indian-trained dentist and founder of Phoenix Dental Academy, which prepares overseas dentists for the Overseas Registration Examination. She also teaches at the College of Medicine and Dentistry in Birmingham, part of Ulster University, and works one day a week as clinical lead for overseas clinicians within a dental group.

Ben Barter has never drilled a tooth in his life, but he's spent more time in dental events than most dentists. He joins Payman as co-founder of Dental Assembly, the latest venture in a career built entirely on getting corporates and suppliers into the same room, first at Open Rooms, then Dental Forum, and now running his own show. In between, there's a properly strange detour: a price comparison app for beauty products, built with zero knowledge of beauty or technology, launched into a global pandemic, and later pitched successfully on Dragons Den. Ben talks candidly about what actually convinces an investor to back two people with no relevant experience, and the gut feeling he ignored right before a bus full of a hundred people failed to turn up in Dubai. There's a decent amount of shop talk here too, on why fun is a business strategy rather than an afterthought, and why splitting an event by practice size might be the most underrated idea in dental networking right now. In This Episode 00:00:45 – Introduction 00:01:00 – Life running dental events 00:09:45 – Getting into events 00:12:55 – Lessons from Open Rooms 00:15:45 – Starting Skin during Covid 00:21:15 – Going on Dragons Den 00:26:20 – Raising money for the first time 00:28:30 – Launching Dental Assembly 00:33:00 – Structuring the events 00:37:35 – Why fun matters 00:48:45 – Touchpoints beyond the event 00:50:55 – Blackbox thinking 01:01:45 – Favourite resource and book 01:04:40 – Fantasy dinner party 01:08:05 – Growing up and life outside events About Ben Barter Ben Barter is co-founder of Dental Assembly, an events business connecting dental groups with suppliers, and previously spent nine years at Open Rooms and Dental Forum. He also co-founded Skin, a price comparison app for beauty products that secured investment on Dragons Den, before returning to dental events full time.

Bashar Alturk has represented two countries at trampolining — Great Britain, then Jordan — and ruptured both his knees doing it, a year apart, once right before finals. He's also a final-year dental student at Leeds who bought his own phantom head and drill and set them up in his student room because the university wouldn't give him enough practice time. His ADHD diagnosis came late on purpose. His mum spotted it in primary school and refused to let it be labelled, worried about what that label would do to him; he didn't get assessed properly until Covid forced the question. He now credits the delay with making him work harder rather than lean on an excuse. There's a loupes business in here too, run out of that same student room, undercutting the market on price until his own dental school shut it down over a GDC conduct issue. And there's a longer, harder conversation about faith: what he actually believes about suffering and reasons, tested properly the first time his knee gave out weeks before an Olympic cycle. Payman keeps circling one question throughout: what happens when you take the "sink or swim" mentality that built an Olympic athlete and try to run a dental career on it too. In This Episode 00:00:50 – Introduction 00:02:10 – Growing up in Manchester 00:06:40 – Getting into trampolining 00:11:53 – ADHD diagnosis 00:18:35 – Injuries and setbacks 00:33:00 – Sacrifice and family 00:41:52 – Faith and meaning 00:46:25 – The phantom head 00:48:28 – The loupes business 01:02:41 – Delegation 01:11:56 – Wanting to be known 01:19:36 – Choosing a path 01:20:41 – Blackbox thinking 01:29:47 – Fantasy dinner party 01:36:57 – Post-competition blues About Bashar Alturk Bashar Alturk is a final-year dental student at the University of Leeds and an Olympic-level trampolinist, having represented both Great Britain and Jordan internationally. Alongside his studies, he founded a student loupes company, served as president of his dental society, and helped organise one of the UK's largest undergraduate dental conferences.

Afzal Haque joins Payman as a specialist endodontist and owner of Stretford Road Dental Practice, along with its referral clinic M41 Indo, in South Manchester, having spent ten years as a general dentist before making the switch. He talks candidly about hating endodontics as a young dentist, the wife who talked him into rotary instrumentation and then, years later, into selling their house to fund three years of specialist training in Liverpool. There's a properly moving stretch on the sacrifice that decision demanded of his young family, and on the culture of fear he encountered as an undergraduate that still shapes how he teaches today. This is also a masterclass in referral dentistry: building trust with generalists, pricing endodontic treatment simply, and why the happiest dentists are the ones who communicate well rather than the ones who never make mistakes. Expect sharp thinking on bioceramics, root canal myths, AI in the surgery, and a properly honest account of growing up as the only brown kid in his primary school class. In This Episode 00:00:45 – Introduction 00:02:10 – Family background and choosing dentistry 00:13:30 – Falling into endodontics 00:15:50 – Selling the house for specialist training 00:22:55 – Why endo suits him better than general dentistry 00:28:25 – Building a referral-based practice 00:40:45 – Team, AI and running the practice 00:45:35 – Endo heroes and technique 00:59:15 – Bioceramics and modern materials 01:01:50 – Root canal myths and AI search 01:08:45 – Toxic teaching culture 01:15:50 – Specialist training and family sacrifice 01:24:05 – Blackbox thinking 01:35:25 – Robots and the future of dentistry 01:38:15 – Fantasy dinner party and growing up in Manchester About Afzal Haque Afzal Haque is a specialist endodontist and owner of Stretford Road Dental Practice and its referral clinic, M41 Indo, in South Manchester. He spent ten years as a general dentist before training as an endodontist at the University of Liverpool, and now also works as a senior lecturer at UCLan and as a specialist adviser for the CQC.

Patrycja Galonzka joins Payman as business manager at Aspire Smiles in Warwick, having worked her way up from trainee dental nurse to the top of the practice after moving to the UK from Poland at nineteen. She talks candidly about the loss that pushed her to stay in the UK rather than go home, and how years spent as a barista and waitress taught her more about handling people than any qualification could. This is also a masterclass in practice culture: Patrycja walks through her own Caesar framework for running a team, why "anti-values" like blame and gossip do more damage than any missing policy, and why she'd rather build a team like a sports squad than a family. Expect sharp, practical thinking on KPIs, AI in the day-to-day of a practice, and why taking the blame for everything that goes wrong might be the happiest way to lead. In This Episode 00:00:50 – Introduction 00:01:50 – From Poland to dental nursing 00:09:00 – Ambition, patience and advice to her daughter 00:12:00 – Awards and ego 00:17:00 – Finding your why 00:19:00 – Anti-values and team culture 00:22:00 – The Caesar framework 00:35:00 – Empowerment and learning from mistakes 00:48:00 – KPIs that matter 00:52:00 – AI in the practice 01:01:00 – Robots and the future of dentistry 01:07:00 – Alternative business models 01:21:00 – Blackbox thinking 01:26:00 – Time management, boundaries and the five-year vision About Patrycja Galonzka Patrycja Galonzka is business manager at Aspire Smiles in Warwick, having progressed there from trainee dental nurse through lead nurse and practice manager. She moved to the UK from Poland at nineteen, is the creator of the Caesar leadership framework, and now runs her own consulting business helping dental teams build stronger culture and systems alongside her practice role.

Agne Malisauskiene joins Payman as the clinical lead at the Baltic Academy of Aesthetic Dentistry and one of the world's best-known minimally invasive composite teachers, having trained thousands of dentists from her purpose-built facility in Vilnius. She talks candidly about swapping punishing NHS-style hours in Lithuania for a much gentler introduction to UK private dentistry, and how a year at a US military boarding school as a teenager shaped the discipline and leadership instincts she still relies on today. This is also a conversation about ambition and what it costs. From the competitive streak that pushed her toward the hardest degree to get into, to the guilt and logistics of teaching abroad most weekends while raising two young boys, Agne is refreshingly honest about the trade-offs behind a career built on repetition, pattern recognition and constant travel. Expect sharp reflections on gender and ambition in dental education, why composite bonding took off early in Lithuania, and a clinical mistake that changed how she treats every tooth since. In This Episode 00:00:50 – Introduction 00:02:40 – Building the Vilnius teaching facility 00:11:57 – Moving to the UK 00:18:27 – Boarding school in America 00:30:57 – Family background and choosing dentistry 00:39:41 – Ambition, competitiveness and sacrifice 00:46:47 – Family life and growing up in Soviet-era Lithuania 00:53:12 – A typical teaching week and travel logistics 01:02:32 – Joining Biomimetic 01:07:33 – Gender, ambition and teaching 01:15:53 – Filming through the loupe camera 01:22:47 – Blackbox thinking 01:26:32 – Favourite resource: Layers 2 01:30:27 – Fantasy dinner party About Agne Malisauskiene Agne Malisauskiene is an internationally recognised minimally invasive direct composite expert and the clinical lead at the Baltic Academy of Aesthetic Dentistry in Vilnius, where she trains dentists from around the world. She is a member of Biomimetic and Enlighten's distributor in Lithuania, and splits her time between her own patients and a busy international lecturing schedule.

Shyun Patel joins Payman as a final-year dental student at Liverpool, best known for founding BDSA, the biggest undergraduate dental conference the UK has seen, and for buying his own practice before he's even qualified. He talks candidly about losing the Dental Society presidency election, the autoimmune diagnosis that reshaped how he thinks about time, and the fridge-flipping side hustle that helped fund his first practice. This is also a conversation about ambition and its cost. From the cathedral gamble that saved BDSA's gala dinner to the balance between depth and breadth of impact, Shyun's reflections on business are as sharp as his reflections on himself. Expect thoughtful exchanges on hubris, communication as a clinical skill, sacrifice, and what it means to build something at 23 that most people wait decades to attempt. In This Episode 00:00:50 – Introduction 00:01:30 – Growing up in Liverpool 00:06:14 – Communication vs skill 00:08:36 – Teaching communication 00:14:00 – Public misconceptions 00:22:38 – Hubris 00:22:52 – Insecurity and upbringing 00:32:57 – Losing DentSoc presidency 00:41:20 – Autoimmune diagnosis 00:50:07 – Building a dating app 00:58:00 – Business by osmosis 01:01:26 – The value of asking 01:04:32 – Scale of BDSA 01:07:26 – Funding BDSA 01:17:07 – Leadership and delegation 01:21:00 – Sales and sponsorship 01:25:10 – The cathedral gamble 01:29:47 – The fridge hustle 01:41:07 – Ambition and sacrifice 01:47:43 – Blackbox thinking 01:52:41 – Clinical vs business 01:59:35 – Depth vs breadth 02:01:11 – Heroes and resources 02:05:29 – Fantasy dinner party 02:07:31 – Five-year vision About Shyun Patel Shyun Patel is a final-year dental student at the University of Liverpool and the founder of BDSA, the largest undergraduate dental conference staged in the UK to date. Alongside his studies he already owns a dental practice, works as a dental rep for Bryant, and is building a compatibility-focused dating app in his spare time.

Two CareStack men, one origin story that starts in a Covid ward. Adrian Dray talks Payman through the lead-management deal that nearly bankrupted him, and how that near-miss set him up to bring an American cloud practice management system into a UK market that, by his own admission, "really dislikes change." Kautham Haran, the ops brain to Adrian's front-of-house energy, explains how a fintech Start-Up background prepared him for the mess of onboarding whole dental groups onto new software. Between them they cover why CareStack bet big on a market the size of Oregon, what Rory Sutherland taught them about friction and the "doorman fallacy," and why AI receptionists might be dentistry's answer to the hoverboard fire hazard. It's a conversation about building a company from scratch inside an industry built on habit, and what happens to your ego when the whole thing goes a bit public and a bit personal. In This Episode 00:01:00 - Introductions 00:01:35 - Covid and crisis 00:07:25 - Meeting Abby 00:11:25 - Kautham's fintech past 00:14:15 - The leadership trio 00:16:00 - Opportunity, defined 00:23:10 - Cracking the UK 00:31:55 - Straumann and strategy 00:36:35 - Built-in payment plans 00:39:55 - Onboarding challenges 00:44:55 - Surprises in dentistry 00:50:25 - Software's weak spot 00:54:50 - Regulation as moat 00:56:20 - Shaking up events 01:03:55 - Rory's insights 01:14:15 - Voice Stack AI 01:17:45 - AI receptionist risks 01:22:45 - Blackbox thinking 01:32:25 - Fantasy dinner party 01:40:55 - Closing thoughts About Adrian Dray and Kautham Haran Adrian Dray is director of demand generation at CareStack, a cloud-based dental practice management system, having previously worked as a data protection officer within dentistry. Kautham Haran is CareStack's head of implementation, joining from a peer-to-peer invoice finance Start-Up he co-founded straight out of the University of Warwick. Together they lead CareStack's UK operation alongside Shamanth, their head of customer success.

Neil Sikka joins Payman to reflect on a career that has moved from single-surgery NHS dentistry in Bethnal Green to building a ten-practice London group, selling to Bupa, and now helping shape clinical strategy across one of the UK’s biggest dental organisations. He talks candidly about the Barbican Dental Care years, why he chose cultural fit over the highest offer when selling, and why he still practises one day a week after decades in the profession. This is also a conversation about service. From funding a dental carriage on India’s Lifeline Express to supporting Dentaid and Mercy Ships, Neil’s work outside the surgery is just as revealing as his business story. Expect thoughtful reflections on the mouth-body connection, Bupa’s future, clinical excellence, personal branding, charitable dentistry and the quiet art of getting on with people. In This Episode 00:01:00 - Bupa, leadership and clinical voice 00:02:45 - From Bethnal Green to Barbican 00:06:40 - Growing ten practices 00:10:30 - Selling the business 00:14:00 - Risk, reward and optimism 00:16:10 - Lifeline Express 00:21:35 - Mercy Ships and Dentaid 00:28:20 - Childhood and family 00:35:15 - Why he still practises 00:37:30 - Blackbox thinking 00:45:30 - Life inside Bupa 00:52:00 - Bupa Training Academy 00:57:00 - Mouth-body connection 00:59:15 - Personal branding 01:07:25 - A week in Neil’s life 01:18:15 - Dental learning and mentors 01:22:30 - Music, golf and real tennis 01:25:45 - Fantasy dinner party 01:28:40 - Last days and legacy About Neil Sikka Neil Sikka is Chief Dental Officer for Bupa Dental Insurance and Director of Dentistry at Bupa Dental Care. Before joining Bupa, he founded and grew Barbican Dental Care into a ten-practice London group, building a corporate dental plan model for major employers. He continues to practise one day a week and has long supported access-to-care projects through Dentaid, Mercy Ships and India’s Lifeline Express.

Recorded live at Bupa Dental Health Is Live, this Dental Leaders episode sees Payman joined by Andrew Bower from Philips Oral Healthcare for a sharp look at dentistry in 2040. The conversation moves from AI, robotics and connected toothbrushes to the bigger question of how oral health can become part of everyday whole-body care. Andrew explores Philips’ long-term view on prevention, consumer behaviour, clinical evidence and the challenge of making oral care feel less like a chore and more like a daily ritual. There’s also a grounded reminder that, even with smarter tools and faster data, dentistry still comes back to care, trust and human connection. In This Episode 00:02:05 - Dentistry in 2040 00:04:15 - Predictions and connectivity 00:05:00 - Oral care apathy 00:08:00 - Power toothbrush adoption 00:10:30 - Global dental differences 00:12:20 - Mouth-body connection 00:14:00 - Diagnostics and data 00:15:35 - Robots and clinicians 00:22:20 - Connected toothbrushes 00:40:20 - AI and productivity 00:47:25 - Last days and legacy 00:48:00 - Fantasy dinner party About Andrew Bower Andrew Bower is the global product category lead for Philips Oral Healthcare. With more than 20 years at Philips across consumer health, women’s health and oral care, he brings a global view of how technology, prevention and behavioural change are shaping the future of healthcare.

Ian Dunn didn't set out to become a periodontist. A chance encounter with a stranger in a hospital corridor, a course he took on a whim, and the absence of anyone else doing the job in Liverpool — that's how a specialism was born. In this episode, Payman sits down with Ian to trace a career shaped as much by happy accidents as by hard graft; from a comprehensive school kid who retook his A-levels, to one of the most respected perio voices in the north west. They cover the state of the profession — social media's double edge, the case for CPD reform, awards culture, and the strange silence around perio's role in systemic health. Ian is candid about a GDC case that cost him eleven months of sleep, and equally candid about why he'd never swap his associate chair for a principal's desk. In This Episod e 00:01:25 — Growing up in Liverpool 00:02:10 — Student life at Leeds 00:05:35 — Route into dentistry 00:11:50 — Ethics and professionalism 00:18:50 — Life as a GDP 00:19:25 — Route into periodontics 00:29:30 — How perio has changed 00:41:35 — The mouth-body connection 00:46:00 — What's changed in perio 00:52:55 — Good vs great periodontists 00:56:35 — Industry, big pharma and public education 01:00:25 — What grinds your gears 01:05:00 — Social media, awards and measuring success 01:15:25 — Teaching and self-promotion 01:16:30 — Hygienists, teamwork and hierarchy 01:20:25 — Liverpool 01:24:15 — Blackbox thinking 01:27:45 — GDC complaint 01:39:50 — Associate life and practice ownership 01:46:05 — Best lectures and resources 01:53:25 — Fantasy dinner party 01:56:15 — How Ian wants to be remembered About Ian Dunn Ian Dunn is a specialist periodontist based at Rose Lane Dental Practice in Liverpool, where he has worked for over 15 years. A graduate of Leeds, he spent a decade as an NHS GDP before finding his way into perio through a combination of luck, timing and relentless curiosity. Alongside his clinical work, Ian teaches on perio courses and has been active with the British Society of Periodontology, where he is a vocal advocate for hygienists, therapists, and anyone who believes the gums are everyone's business.

From pizza shop to Maxfax theatre — Sina Gilannejad's route into dentistry is anything but straightforward. Born in Northern Ireland to Iranian parents, Sina brings a rare blend of warmth, self-awareness, and hard-won clinical confidence to this conversation. He opens up about the anxiety that drove him towards DCT, the perfectionism that almost derailed him, and how a stint in maxillofacial surgery — confronting cancer, mortality, and the limits of medicine — fundamentally changed his relationship with the job. It's an honest, searching episode about what it actually means to become a dentist, and what to do once you've got there. In This Episode 00:01:10 - Extraction anxiety and the road to DCT 00:02:10 - Growing up in Northern Ireland 00:03:45 - Working in his dad's pizza shop 00:08:30 - Dental school in Bristol 00:16:45 - Politics, cancel culture and the Overton window 00:24:00 - "Most Presenting Complaint" — the podcast with Adam 00:25:25 - The FD year: imposter syndrome and mental health struggles 00:35:35 - Practitioners Health and CBT 00:39:20 - Patient communication and dentistry's image problem 00:41:45 - DCT explained — the case for and against 00:44:50 - DCT1 in Cardiff: oral medicine, oral surgery and Mike Lewis 00:50:05 - Choosing Maxfax — Chesterfield and DCT2 00:53:35 - Advice bias: the responsibility of giving career guidance 00:57:05 - To specialise or not to specialise 01:02:00 - General practice at Dental Beauty 01:04:10 - Wisdom teeth, retained roots and the perils of perfectionism 01:05:20 - Implants: the next step? 01:11:00 - Practice ownership, the super associate and social media 01:14:50 - Maxfax, mortality and perspective 01:22:10 - Blackbox thinking 01:26:50 - Teaching, favourite resources and DCT study budgets 01:38:50 - Fantasy dinner party 01:42:25 - Last days and legacy About Sina Gilannejad Sina Gilannejad is a dental core trainee who completed DCT1 in oral surgery and oral medicine at Cardiff and DCT2 in maxillofacial surgery at Chesterfield. A Bristol dental school graduate and former dental school president, he now works as an associate at Dental Beauty practices in Dalston and Basildon, with a particular interest in oral surgery and conscious sedation. He is also co-host of the Most Presenting Complaint podcast alongside fellow dentist Adam.

Meghan Chard is many things at once — principal dentist, practice owner, mum of three, and quietly passionate evangelist for childhood airway health. In this episode, she sits down with Payman for a wide-ranging conversation that takes in meeting her husband Simon at dental school, buying his family's Leicestershire practice a month before their first child arrived, and the very particular chaos of juggling clinical work, business ownership, and family life. Then there's the airway thread — and once Meghan gets going, you can see why she's hooked. Sleep disordered breathing in children is, she argues, a dramatically underscreened problem, and dentists are uniquely placed to spot it. In This Episode 00:00:55 — Introductions and Rothley Lodge 00:02:30 — Meeting Simon at King's 00:05:10 — Life as associates, then buying the practice 00:06:05 — Running the practice: ops vs. direction 00:08:25 — The dental family advantage 00:12:45 — Learning the numbers — and how Pärla helped 00:13:00 — Staff management and the art of delegation 00:15:30 — Superpowers and self-awareness 00:17:35 — The juggle: three kids, two clinical days, one nanny 00:20:00 — Something has to give 00:26:10 — Mary McAleese, Belfast, and family roots 00:30:05 — Childhood airway obstruction: signs, symptoms and the dentist's role 00:40:05 — Treatment: referral, palatal expansion and the habit-corrector appliance 00:54:10 — Case studies and outcomes 00:58:35 — Pärla: the emotional roller coaster of consumer business 01:05:35 — Covid and the darkest days of practice ownership 01:08:20 — Dental school, inferiority, and graduating second in the year 01:16:30 — Blackbox thinking 01:26:25 — Faith, spirituality, and community 01:30:50 — Succession planning 01:35:10 — How Meghan ended up in dentistry 01:39:15 — Best lecture: Malcolm Levinkind on teeth, posture and the body 01:41:50 — Favourite resources: Breath , Breathe Sleep Thrive , Saved by the Mouth 01:42:45 — Sauna obsession and longevity habits 01:43:55 — Fantasy dinner party 01:45:40 — What she'd do differently About Meghan Chard Meghan Chard is a principal dentist and co-owner of Rothley Lodge Dental Practice in Leicestershire, which she and her husband Simon Chard took over from his family in 2018. Alongside clinical practice and running the business, she has developed a keen interest in childhood sleep disordered breathing and consults for a paediatric airway appliance brand. She is also a niece-in-law of Mary McAleese, former President of Ireland.

What happens when a mechanical engineer spends a decade fixing factories, then walks away from it all to start dental school at 34? Henry Totterdell joins Payman to tell that story. He talks about the years spent solving problems on aircraft carriers and chemotherapy production lines, the slow-burning itch to do something with his hands, and why he finally took the plunge. Along the way they get into first principles, the magic of human connection over Zoom, where robots might fit into the chair one day, and the quiet privilege of a patient simply saying thank you. It's a conversation about taking the long way round — and arriving exactly where you meant to. In This Episode 00:01:55 - Travel and adventure 00:05:20 - Childhood in Stroud 00:06:15 - Choosing engineering 00:07:35 - Loughborough years 00:08:45 - Engineering versus dentistry 00:10:00 - First principles thinking 00:12:10 - Life as a consultant 00:17:15 - Losing his purpose 00:18:35 - The pharmaceutical world 00:21:00 - The itch to do medicine 00:22:15 - Working with his hands 00:23:50 - The leap to dental school 00:31:50 - The Innovations Hub 00:36:05 - First extraction 00:38:40 - Blackbox thinking 00:43:45 - Starting a business 00:44:55 - Lectures that stuck 00:48:10 - What makes a course brilliant 00:50:25 - The magic of being in the room 00:52:15 - Soft skills and integrity 00:54:20 - Reading the patient 00:57:45 - Regrets 01:01:45 - Robots in the chair 01:06:00 - Relentless optimism 01:06:45 - Darkest days 01:10:20 - Nervous patients 01:13:40 - Awards and recognition 01:16:20 - Confidence and family 01:18:35 - Fantasy dinner party 01:20:45 - Last days and legacy About Henry Totterdell Henry Totterdell is a third-year dental student at Bristol, having come to dentistry after a decade as a mechanical engineer and consultant. A Loughborough graduate, he worked across defence, pharmaceuticals and manufacturing before retraining at 34. Alongside his studies he runs a Dental Innovations Hub at Bristol, introducing students to the technology and business side of dentistry that the course doesn't cover.

Ali Al-Hassan is the walking embodiment of work hard, play hard — a young dentist who's gone from associate to super associate, practice co-owner and globe-trotter, all while building a following that brings patients straight to his chair. In this episode, he and Payman get into what really separates an ordinary associate from a "super" one: bringing in your own patients, owning your fees, and treating social media as your digital shop front. There's honest talk about outworking self-doubt, the awards debate, a vexatious GDC referral that came out of nowhere, and a wild Covid-era trading story that took a £50k bounce-back loan to seven figures and most of the way back down again. Threaded throughout is a simple philosophy — do the thing, do it thousands of times, and let it compound. You'll come away with plenty to think about, whether you're weighing up your own brand or just wondering how one person fits in this much living. In This Episode 00:02:30 - Work hard, play hard 00:08:10 - Growing up and family 00:14:30 - The inflection point 00:17:30 - Associate vs super associate 00:24:40 - Social media and the first Invisalign open day 00:33:15 - Tenacity and outworking self-doubt 00:39:05 - Niching down 00:49:50 - Cornerstones of safe GDP ortho 00:53:50 - Blackbox thinking 00:59:30 - The GDC referral 01:08:45 - Compounding and word of mouth 01:09:45 - Dental Opulence 01:18:55 - The awards debate 01:25:35 - Travel and friendships 01:29:25 - Working with Robbie 01:32:05 - The Covid trading story 01:42:25 - Examinations and case acceptance 01:48:05 - Composite bonding approach 01:54:50 - Finishing teeth upside down 01:56:25 - Fantasy dinner party 02:00:25 - Last days and legacy About Ali Al-Hassan Ali Al-Hassan, known online as Doctor Ali, is a Cardiff-trained dentist working across practices in Swindon, the Midlands and London, with a focus on Invisalign and composite. He's a super associate who built his patient base through years of consistent social media, and co-owns the Dental Opulence clinic in the Midlands. Away from the chair, he travels monthly, invests, and is renovating a house back home in Swindon.

Ashley King and Sophie Lovett run the international side of Pearl, the AI company that reads dental radiographs — and they turn up as a self-confessed package deal. The chat starts with what the tech actually does (a second opinion for clinicians, and a way to help patients finally see what's going on in their own mouths), but it doesn't stay there for long. Payman, Ashley and Sophie get into US versus UK dentistry, the state of the NHS, why trust beats price every time, and how AI is creeping into everyday work. Then it gets personal: women and AI, the awkwardness of asking for a pay rise, what happens when a woman out-earns her partner, and whether having children is selfless or selfish. Honest, funny and occasionally controversial — this one wanders well beyond the X-ray. In This Episode 00:00:50 - Life at a start-up 00:02:20 - Life on the road 00:04:35 - Distributors or your own office 00:06:05 - What Pearl does 00:09:30 - Accuracy and limits 00:10:45 - A controversial take 00:12:45 - AI and the future 00:18:35 - A cottage industry 00:21:20 - US vs UK dentistry 00:24:40 - NHS vs private 00:30:20 - Getting set up 00:34:00 - The price 00:35:40 - Why trust is everything 00:37:45 - The word "sell" 00:40:35 - Living in London 00:46:50 - The worst of America 00:51:50 - Politics 00:56:05 - AI in their own work 01:00:50 - Women and AI 01:02:30 - The pay rise problem 01:05:20 - The gender pay gap 01:08:25 - Femininity as power 01:11:00 - Relationships and self-reliance 01:13:55 - Children 01:16:30 - Out-earning a partner 01:25:10 - "I'm just a hygienist" 01:26:30 - Business influences 01:33:50 - Biggest business mistakes 01:38:40 - Competitors and USP 01:45:40 - Guilty pleasures 01:49:05 - Fantasy dinner party 01:54:00 - Ministry of Sound About Ashley King & Sophie Lovett Ashley King leads international partnerships at Pearl, having started out in dental back in 2018 at VOCO; she's from North Carolina and now calls London home. Sophie Lovett heads up Pearl's international market development and, despite only three years in dentistry, talks the clinical language like a native. The two are best friends as much as colleagues — which is exactly why they turned up to record together.

Professor Tara Renton OBE brings four generations of dental history — and a career built on curiosity rather than ambition — to her conversation with Payman. From navigating undiagnosed dyslexia and a father who begged her not to follow him into dentistry, to becoming the first female chair of oral surgery at King's College London, her story is one of serendipity, resilience, and an almost obsessive interest in the patient behind the pain. She shares remarkable insights into orofacial pain — nerve injuries, psychosocial histories, patients whose chronic pain only begins to shift when someone finally takes the time to ask the right question — and makes a compelling case for multidisciplinary thinking in a profession she feels has been far too siloed for far too long. Sharp reflections on surgical safety, local anaesthetic technique, and the state of dental education sit alongside something warmer: a life philosophy that's disarmingly simple. Stay curious. In This Episode 00:02:50 - Four generations of dentists 00:06:05 - Child dental health crisis 00:07:20 - New grandmother 00:10:00 - Choosing dentistry 00:17:05 - Serendipity over ambition 00:37:15 - The juggle: three kids and a PhD 00:41:00 - Bullying and misogyny in surgery 00:44:45 - King's: first chair in oral surgery 00:47:35 - Multidisciplinary pain clinic 00:49:25 - The Iranian patient 00:56:00 - Trust underpins consent 01:00:00 - Classifying orofacial pain 01:07:05 - When grief resolves chronic pain 01:12:15 - Blackbox thinking 01:17:00 - Local anaesthetic tips 01:22:00 - Wrong site surgery 01:25:30 - Dental student selection 01:27:15 - Redesigning the dental course 01:47:50 - Bruxism: rethinking the evidence 01:50:15 - Fantasy dinner party 01:53:45 - Last days and legacy About Professor Tara Renton OBE Professor Tara Renton OBE is Emeritus Professor of Oral Surgery at King's College London Dental Institute, where she became the first female chair of oral surgery — and one of the world's leading authorities on orofacial pain and nerve injury. Over a career spanning more than 40 years, she has authored over 250 research papers, completed a PhD centred on morbidity following third molar surgery, established a pioneering multidisciplinary pain clinic at King's, and carried out extensive medico-legal work in surgical safety. She is the co-founder of the patient resource orofacialpain.org.uk.

Mike Gray's path to dentistry was anything but straightforward — and that's precisely what makes this conversation so compelling. A former semi-professional mountain biker who raced the World Series across three disciplines, a musician who once had the head of Universal Publishing sitting in his living room in rural Wales, and a dentist who spent years doing everything he could to avoid dentistry, Mike has lived several lives before arriving at the one he clearly loves. Payman and Mike cover the full sweep — grief, therapy, surgical war stories, and an obsessive, self-taught approach to digital restorative dentistry that culminates in his POISE Protocol: a no-prep veneer workflow that he believes makes truly minimally invasive ceramics available to the vast majority of patients, not just a lucky five per cent. In This Episode 00:00:55 – Introductions and first impressions 00:01:20 – Mountain biking career 00:09:15 – A friend's suicide, guilt and stepping back from maxfax 00:12:15 – Therapy 00:14:10 – Life on the World Series circuit 00:19:25 – From maxfax to music 00:28:10 – Blackbox thinking 00:33:45 – Music career — Alabama Three, Peppa Pig and Covid 00:49:25 – NHS dentistry debate 00:51:50 – Falling in love with dentistry 00:54:40 – Self-taught restorative and the digital workflow 01:00:25 – Ditching the articulator 01:01:20 – Prototypes, not temporaries 01:05:10 – Into implants 01:11:00 – Compassion fatigue 01:13:40 – POISE protocol and no-prep ceramics 01:25:10 – The Lodge and the course 01:29:05 – Resilience and failure 01:34:20 – Practice ownership 01:41:10 – Instagram 01:49:20 – Fantasy dinner party About Mike Gray Mike Gray is a dentist based in Wales, working at Parkway Clinic in Swansea and The Lodge — a referral and education centre where he hosts his sold-out POISE Protocol course on minimally invasive ceramic veneers. His background spans maxillofacial surgery, semi-professional mountain biking at World Series level, and a music career that attracted interest from Universal Publishing and, improbably, Peppa Pig. He teaches himself CAD, machines his own surgical instruments, and has spent five years developing a digital workflow for no-prep ceramic restorations that he believes renders feldspathic and heavy preparation largely redundant.

Rawa Jawad Quinn is a dentist-turned-tech founder whose restless energy and refusal to be underestimated have shaped every chapter of her career. In this episode, she tells Payman about growing up in Chelsea after her Iraqi family fled Kuwait with nothing, studying in Liverpool, and working across 16 dental practices before channelling her frustrations into Medicube — a consent and patient communication platform built to give associates the consistency they've never had. The conversation takes some wonderfully unexpected detours into quantum physics, telepathy, AI-driven futures and the spiritual experiences that Rawa can't quite explain but absolutely trusts. There's also plenty of practical wisdom on occlusion, practice culture and what it really takes to bootstrap a dental tech start-up while raising a three-year-old without a nanny. In This Episode 00:00:45 – Introduction and welcome 00:01:25 – Growing up on the Kings Road and childhood in Chelsea 00:03:30 – Studying dentistry in Liverpool and reinvention 00:07:00 – Dyslexia diagnosis and learning differently 00:10:10 – The itch beyond dentistry 00:14:00 – Fleeing Kuwait, starting over in the UK 00:16:25 – Why her parents' medical careers put her off medicine 00:18:05 – Ambition, being underestimated and self-belief 00:23:15 – Spirituality, connectedness and trusting intuition 00:26:10 – Wanting it all — motherhood, marriage and a start-up 00:31:00 – Lessons from 16 dental practices 00:36:25 – Working in corporates and at Bupa 00:41:20 – NHS vs private practice 00:45:15 – The birth of Medicube 00:48:30 – How Medicube works and pilot results 00:55:55 – Finding a co-founder and the UCL connection 00:58:50 – Funding through grants, awards and bootstrapping 01:03:25 – AI, the Turing test and the future of work 01:10:25 – Robots, relationships and what makes us human 01:22:55 – Physics, multiverse theory and keeping an open mind 01:28:40 – Blackbox thinking 01:33:40 – A patient with buyer's remorse after crown preps 01:36:55 – Occlusion, full mouth rehabs and the Dawson Academy 01:43:20 – Tech conferences and the reality of being a founder 01:47:05 – Fantasy dinner party About Rawa Jawad Quinn Rawa Jawad Quinn is a dentist based in Belfast, currently working at Bupa, with a particular interest in full mouth rehabilitation cases. She is also the co-founder of Medicube, a dental tech platform that streamlines consent, treatment planning and patient communication. Rawa trained at the Dawson Academy and Chris Hall's programme, and has worked across 16 practices spanning NHS, private and corporate settings.