You Don’t Have to Reinvent Dentistry to be a Success (E.245)
“Dentistry is one of those really wonderful professions where… if you excel, when you go to the courses that you want to go to, and you do the things that you find fun and challenging, it makes your dental career really fun and interesting.” ~Dr. Bruce B. Baird
Join us for an insightful episode of the Productive Dentist Podcast, where host Dr. Bruce Baird sits down with special guest Dr. Wade Kifer, owner of Northwest Arkansas Family Dental. In this engaging conversation, Dr. Kifer shares his unique journey in dentistry—a path defined not by groundbreaking innovations but by a relentless focus on implementing the best practices learned from top mentors like Dr. John Kois and Dr. Bruce Baird himself.
With humility and candor, Dr. Kifer talks about how he initially struggled to apply what he learned at renowned dental courses and how a pivotal moment with a mentor changed the trajectory of his career. This shift led him to fully embrace comprehensive dentistry, transforming his practice into one that thrives on patient care, reduced stress, and a genuine love for the profession.
Whether you’re a seasoned dentist seeking inspiration or a young practitioner navigating the early stages of your career, this episode offers valuable lessons on the power of mentorship, the importance of hands-on learning, and the benefits of building a practice that supports both professional growth and personal fulfillment. Tune in and discover how implementing small changes can lead to big results in your practice.
As you listen to this episode, we invite you to think about the following questions:
- How effectively am I implementing the knowledge I gain from courses, mentors, and other professional development opportunities in my practice?
- Who are the key mentors in my career, and how can I deepen those relationships to continue growing personally and professionally?
- Am I finding joy and fulfillment in my practice, and what steps can I take to reduce stress and maintain enthusiasm for dentistry?
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:00] Announcer: The Productive Dentist Academy Podcast Network.
[00:00:03] Dr. Wade Kifer: You don’t have to be a Bruce Baird or a John Kois or a Karl Misch to really enjoy this profession or even advance in this profession. You just gotta take a little bit and how do you implement those things in your practice. So that’s been the biggest part of my journey.
[00:00:17] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Hello everyone, this is Dr. Bruce B. Baird and you’re listening to the Productive Dentist Podcast. In this podcast, I will give you everything that I’ve learned over the last 40 years in dentistry, working with thousands of dentists, and I’ll tell you, it’s not that my way is the only way. It’s just one that has worked extremely well for me, and I’d love to share that with you. So you too can enjoy the choices in lifestyle that productivity allows. More time for things you love, increased pay, better team relationships, and lowered stress. Let’s get into it with this week’s episode of the Productive Dentist Podcast.
[00:00:52] Regan Robertson: Doctor, did you know that PDA coaching doctors grew 219, 000 on average in just the last 10 months? If your revenue goals fell short this year and you suspect that patient communication and inefficient systems are holding you back, Productive Dentist Academy can help but you have to take action. Register today for the PDA conference, March 13th through the 15th in Frisco, Texas. Go to productivedentist.com to snap up your seat. It is the nation’s leading course for growing your practice and your team. Plus, while you’re there, you can set up a free 60 minute session to identify. opportunities for growth and if you act fast, you could score a one on one with PDA’s co founder, Dr. Bruce Baird. That’s right. We’re only offering 10 and then his calendar is full. Don’t wait, go to productivedentist.com right now and have a great 2025. We’ll see you in Texas.
[00:01:40] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Hey everybody. This is Dr. Bruce Baird with the Productive Dentist Podcast and I’ve got a special guest today, Dr. Wade Kiefer, Northwest Arkansas Family Dentistry. Is that it? What’s the, what’s the full name? It’s not.
[00:01:55] Dr. Wade Kifer: Uh, yeah, that’s the name of the office. Northwest Arkansas Family Dental.
[00:01:58] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: So, okay. That’s great. That’s great. Wade, uh, welcome. I’m really glad we were able to get you on this morning.
[00:02:03] Dr. Wade Kifer: Well, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
[00:02:03] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Tell us a little bit about your journey in dentistry. Besides being a KOIS instructor and a KOIS mentor and everything else, you’ve done so much wonderful things in dentistry. And so just share a little bit about your, your history in dentistry.
[00:02:18] Dr. Wade Kifer: Oh boy. I always, I always kid, you know, because I almost feel like a fraud sometimes. Cause I, you know, I get to spend speak for Productive Dentist Academy some, and I’ve done some things and I get to be a KOIS Clinical Instructor and, I mean, fraud’s not the right word, but I always look at people like you and Mish and John Kois and I say, you know, those are innovators and they come up with something new or they’re doing something and I go, wow, that’s really neat and I always feel like I’ve come along in dentistry and, but it’s been It’s been almost repackaged stuff where I take a little bit here and a little bit there and there’s nothing new. I’ve been good at implementing stuff. I feel like I’ve done a good job in my practice of implementing the things that John has taught, the things that you have taught, and that journey has really just been fun. Now, You know, maybe fraud’s not the right word, but at the same time, there’s nothing new and that’s what I would tell a lot of the young dentists. You don’t have to be a Bruce Baird or a John Kois or a Karl Misch to really enjoy this profession or even advance in this profession. You just gotta take a little bit and how do you implement those things in your practice? So that’s been the biggest part of my journey. Is taking all these little pieces and implementing them and putting them together and it becomes a practice that you can just enjoy less stress and have fun with. I mean, there’s still days we all have days where we’re burnt out. I don’t even care if you’re an innovator, so to speak, you know, you still have days.
[00:03:40] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Patients show up every once in a while.
[00:03:42] Dr. Wade Kifer: Oh, budget patients show up all the time.
[00:03:44] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: But it’s no different than my journey when it comes to that. I mean, going to see Carl and going to see Kois and going to see Pete Dawson and yeah, I can go down the list and there’s really. Nothing new under the sun once you’ve learned it, you know, once you’ve learned it, it’s like, wow, this makes sense and so that’s what I would just share in your own way. That’s what you do at PDA. This is how I’ve taken what I’ve learned in the last 20 years and this is how I teach docs about what I do and I’ve always told people, I mean, Jeff Boosky last year, I think last year or whatever year before he won the best speaker at this big seminar, Dan, a big deal down in Miami, I was talking to him before he went up on stage and I just said, you know, buddy, he’s, yeah, I’m kind of nervous and I said, just tell him what, you know, and. How do you know more? My God, you just keep going to courses. I’m still going to courses. I’m still, even though I put the headpiece down five and a half years ago, it was kind of funny, Cynthia was watching me. I was watching this YouTube video on something. She goes, “well, what are you watching?” I go, “Oh, it’s this new printing technology. And she’s going, “well, why are you, why are you worried about that?” I said, “Well, I’m still a dentist. I’m not dead yet.” You know, so, you know, it’s, it’s been, it’s been fun. Tell me a little bit about your journey with KOIS.
[00:04:54] Dr. Wade Kifer: You know, it was, uh, 2008 and I first went and, you know, you’re almost, you go in these rooms with these legends and you just sit there and you’re like in awe almost and I just remember leaving that first night after that and I call my wife and like you say, you talk to your wife and I call my wife and I am just on cloud nine. I’m like, it is just transformational. My mind is just absolutely being blown. Uh, the way I felt too when I spurred you out. Yeah, and so, you know, it’s, it was nine courses back then, you know, it’s four, five now, but, uh, you know, I couldn’t just wait to get back but even then I had a mentor at KOIS. I was about halfway through and he sat me down and he said my wife was there. She took that trip and he looks at me and I was so let me ask you a question. He looks at my wife and then he looks at me and he goes, How much of this are you doing in your practice? And there was a little bit of a gut punch almost and I’m like, “Oh, not a lot,” and the guy who’s a mentor, he’s a great friend, looks at my wife, great friend now, he looks at my wife and he goes, “Do you realize your husband’s about 20, 000 in and about five weeks out of the practice and he’s not even using this stuff?” And I went, “Oh,” he gave me some advice and it was basically, you’ve got to go home and do a comprehensive exam on every patient. You’ve got to look at everything comprehensively and you can call it fate or whatever, but then it started. Okay. I need to find my other teachers and mentors and that’s about the time I stumbled on the PDA. I’m getting all this clinical knowledge and then, you know, I’m searching the internet and searching dental town and I got this guy I see on dental town that’s talking about risk factors. I’m like, well, I understand risk factors and I’m not doing them and so that was kind of my quiz journey a little bit and how it merged with my PDA journey was. I was learning the information, but I wasn’t getting to do it. So at that time I dove into PDA and I said, “Okay, I need help implementing.” Like I said, so I hired a coach. I continued on with KOIS and the more I implemented it helped me grow in KOIS too, because now all of a sudden I’m not just a guy going to classes, but I’m a guy doing the work on the patients. Right. And then all of a sudden it’s like, okay, I’m doing this. Let me, let me go ahead and sign up for a mentor exam. You know, I think I could do this and it just snowballs and all of a sudden, you’re going from sitting in the front of the room to that excitement still there. And you just want other people to feel that excitement you have, but you also want them to implement it, right?
[00:07:26] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Absolutely. That gave you some unique tools to talk to people about what they told you. Now you’ve got a new tool in the tool belt. So that’s awesome.
[00:07:33] Dr. Wade Kifer: But even as you start mentoring, it helps me, you know, I come down to PDA and mentor other doctors, you know, we do over the shoulders at my office and I know that was a big part of my journey was rather than just sit there and hear it, I would find people and go, how do you do that? You know? So I remember calling up you one day saying, “You know, I know you’re doing 3000 an hour, but I just can’t sleep. Can I come down and watch you do it?” And, uh, you were so gracious and you said, sure, come on down. I brought my office manager and I brought my assistant. Much more than watching someone do it. It was, it was fascinating to watch you work but at the same time I went, “I could do that too.” Yeah, but having that accountability of my office manager and my assistant, now all of a sudden they’re coming back and going, uh, you do every one of those procedures. You just don’t link them all together. You don’t convince the patients as well. You know, so it was all those tools of them going, well, that patient’s coming in and you can do that. Let’s get that on the schedule. So there’s, and seeing it was huge for me. That’s a big part of my growth.
[00:08:33] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: There’s no question. I went down and years ago, I went and watched Pete Dawson down in, uh, in St. Pete and I. You know, and I call Mish, uh, and I kind of go through the list, watching him actually in practice and you know, you can hear it, you can hear it and you can kind of believe it, but until you see it, then you go, whoa, somebody’s doing it and they’re doing it in a fairly low stress environment. It’s not, it just seems to be almost physiologic. The way, the way you talk about dentistry now and so, and I always tell people, I said, “If you just kind of hang in there long, if you say things a certain way long enough, it becomes something that you always say,” you know, and you can always be ready to add a little, you know, of your own little thing, because it fits best when it comes from our own core beliefs and everything else, but you’re right. I mean, it’s not. Nothing really new under the sun. I mean, there’s new materials. There’s new things like that was scanning, which by the way, I did, uh, I did 10 veneers on my daughter, daughter number two, and I still got it. You know, I mean, we didn’t worry about that. I know, but you know, five and a half years, not holding a hand piece and I did the preps and I scanned it first time I’ve ever scanned the case and did not take an impression and I tell you, I put those things in, they were gorgeous. My, my preps, they sent the models that they had made and I’m like, “These preps look good. I feel good about it. You know? So I’m going to show my dentist buddies that I can still do, you know, it’s dentistry is one of those. Really wonderful professions where, you know, if you excel, when I say excel, I mean, when you go to the courses that you want to go and you do the things that you find fun and challenging, it makes your dental career really fun and interesting, you know, and so that that’s what I’ve been so it’s, it’s really been a great journey and just like that mentor told you. Well, how much have you doing it? Well, do you realize what you’re spending? Well, one of the cool things is we’re all that way. I mean, we’re literally all that way. We go through this and well, you know, I can’t tell you how many guys I taught implants to that I would see 10 years later and how are the implants going? Well, I placed three or four, you know, 10 years later and then there’s others who have, yes, I’ve changed my practice. That’s all I like to do and I’m like, “Wow, you know, that that’s wild, you know, because for me, I like doing everything.” Yeah, and I, you know, I love doing the veneers. I love doing implants. I love doing onlays and inlays and all that kind of stuff. So, um, tell me about your family and your journey with your family.
[00:11:04] Dr. Wade Kifer: Well, I have a wife, been with 20 years and then, uh, three kids, two girls and a boy. It’s interesting when you put your family into it because there are some sacrifices sometimes you’ve had to make, and this is going to bad where you’ve missed out on some things, but the growth has allowed me to not miss out on things, right? You know, I, I remember cause it was hard. The first time I went to KOIS, uh, was in June of 2008. My daughter was born in March. So that was the first time I left my wife for a week. Wow and so that there is like, “Oh my gosh, I’m doing that,” but then the practice has grown so much from that journey that we’re three and a half days a week. We’re talking about going to three, you know, the trips we take now. So, I mean, there is some sacrifices and I never want to say sacrifice your family for your career. Cause I made sure not to do that, but there were some minor things you miss here and there to get where you want to be, to get where you want to be and that’s just life. You can’t do that without it but I’ve made it a very big point to not miss the big things and now they’re 16, 14 and 11. I mean, we don’t miss anything, right? Because we have the time and the practice is good and I mean, it’s not that we don’t ever have struggles in the practice or anything, but you have to, but you do have to put in the work early and I tell people, you know, I don’t know why I keep going back to the over the shoulder, but when I was younger. I wasn’t necessarily working Fridays or half days, but I’d spend the afternoons watching my oral surgeon work, watching my periodonist work, watching my endodontist work and I mean, after that, I knew I didn’t want to do root canals, so it’s not there, but
[00:12:37] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: You know, I don’t like doing, I don’t have to do that.
[00:12:41] Dr. Wade Kifer: So you’ve got to put in that work and so I do think I put in the work and, you know, this week at night, you know, I was sitting in the living room watching a bone grafting course. Yeah. I was, I was home. I had headphones in, I did it in the living room where they’re watching TV, but you know, you, there’s certain things you just got to do so you can get better. Um, but I couldn’t do it without my family. My wife is so supportive. Uh, she’s, she’s amazing. She is awesome
[00:13:08] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Amazing. Every time I see you guys, when you’re coming down to watch a little football games in Dallas or whatever, usually you’ll take the kids to a ball game or something, you know, bring them with you and I’ve seen them there many, many times and for those that you don’t know, Wade is one of our instructors at the school. PDA and has been for a long time. He actually really teaches the risk factors because he’s had so much experience with that and he just shares with all the attendees kind of, gosh, how to do it in a more comfortable way. It’s never comfortable when you first start doing risk factors, but once you’ve gotten used to it and you see positive results, it’s kind of like, you know, Pavlov’s dog means if you keep. Yep. Hitting the same button. You just keep getting a reward and all of a sudden your practice is in a massive growth phase and then you get to control it from there, you get to decide, “Okay, I don’t want it to be any bigger than this. Right? I’m not looking to have a 17 million practice and working 90 day, 90 hours a week.” Um, and there are some people that wanna do that. I’m, not to the expense of family and all, all those things. Uh, I’m realizing that now. Turning 70 this next year. It’s like, well, crap, you know, and my last 14 years in practice, I only worked two days a week. So I started that process of being able to spend more time with family and still enjoy the dentistry at a high level. And, uh, so that, that, that worked for me. It’s kind of like retiring in practice and when I finally put the handpiece down, I was kind of like, Oh gosh, I miss it. I, I still dream, uh, at least. Didn’t dream last night about it, but I dream at least twice a week about dentistry and usually it is every chair in the office is full and I can’t find an assistant. You know, it’s like, it’s the same drain. I wake up about three 30 and I go, It’s a dream, you know, so when I go, go back to sleep and dream about golf or something else, but, but you also had a pretty significant health scare. I don’t, you may not want to talk about it, but it may help some of the other docs that are, that are out there. Do you mind sharing a little bit about that?
[00:15:11] Dr. Wade Kifer: Oh, yeah. Um, no, I mean, it’s. It’s part of my journey and it even becomes part of my story with my patients because it is what it is and then a lot of what we do is how we respond to those things. Right. So, um, I was 37 years old and I still remember cause I was studying for my mentor exam at the KOIS center and, um, I just walking through the house with the family, had my son on my shoulders. Uh, he was like two years old at the time or one and, uh, I tore a coronary artery and, and, uh, I, Had a full blown heart attack and so, uh, rushed to the ER and three stints later, almost opened me up, almost lost me on the table. So God, God had a plan. Um, maybe it was just to scare me a little bit. I don’t know, getting hacked together, but, uh, you know, there you are. But those things after. I mean, you know, my practice kept running. I wasn’t there for me is in the hospital for a week. Remember? Yeah, you know, it’s one of those things, too, because I mean, could I be in better shape? Yes, but I didn’t really have blockage at an aneurysm. You know,
[00:16:11] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: You don’t expect it. It’s just kind of one of those things where you go, Wow, you know, I had my own Yeah, you had a big one. Yeah, I had a big one. I went into cardiac arrest and they were putting the paddles on me in the back of a darn ambulance and, and I’m awake and I’m thinking, “Oh, this is not going to feel good,” and, uh, I converted back, you know, it is what you said was so important is how we respond to what happens to us. Sometimes God’s just giving us a wake up and boy, that was a wake up just like you had now. I’m kind of thinking to myself, well, okay. I had ablation, um, several years ago and I haven’t had any problems with it since but boy, I tell you what, I sure changed some of my behavior. Started doing a little, you know, a little more exercise than I was and probably today I’m in better shape than I was when I was 40. So it’s just how your brain starts to change how you, how you’re thinking. So tell me a little bit about your experience at PDA. What that has meant to you?
[00:17:01] Dr. Wade Kifer: Well, it’s been a huge part because I mentioned earlier about, you know, I was learning to do all the dentistry, but I wasn’t getting to do the dentistry. So I give you a lot of credit cause I still remember where I was sitting. The first time I went to PDA, I’m sitting on that front row. Now, I do think I’m a pretty good implementer, but even then I’ve got my, brought my whole team. I went all in, but you know, I’m like, “Oh, this is a lot. This is a lot,” and my team was going, “Okay, let’s hire one of the coaches.” So we hired our first coach, Angela, uh, he was awesome and so we worked with Angela for years and you know, we just, every few years, the practice would change and grow. So we’d come back to PDA and it was probably my third trip to PDA. And it was kind of funny because we go, you, you kind of talk, we go to the risk factors breakout. I don’t remember who was leading it. It may have been Angela and she called me up on stage and she said, “Wade, why don’t you share with them how you talk to patients and talk risk factors?” So I’m there as a student and Angela pulls me on stage and I think Victoria was in the room at the time. So then it basically grew to, why don’t you come back and share that and share that became part of faculty, but it’s not just a one time here. I mean, if you’re one of those people, you’re Superman because you go back and there’s so much information in any of these courses, but especially PDA, there’s So much good information with scheduling and communication and treatment planning and treatment presentation and marketing, right? So, I don’t know how anyone can come just once and then just do it all. Now, you will get better from one trip, but most people don’t. You need a coach or you do the, I mean, cause I mean, I used to go to your over the shoulder and now I’m leading over the shoulders. Right and it’s fun, but I learned, I mean, I had a girl in the summer, you know, and she’s watching me work. She’s ever, “You ever use this bird for that? You know, it’s just a little simple thing.” I’m like, “No, tell me about that.” You know, I know.
[00:18:59] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: I mean, the cool thing about being in a teaching position truthfully is I learn as much when I’m watching people as I feel like they’re getting because they’ll ask me that question too. Have you ever tried to do this? I go, no, tell me about it. Tell me more about it and so that that’s where PDA has changed over the years. We call people that come back repeat offenders because they keep coming back but that’s the reason that I think we’ve got Such a great following, you know, across dentistry. It’s not about me. It’s about the team that’s put together. Now, early on, it was me and that was it. But now, Victorious, we’re partners and we’ve expanded and we’ve grown and we’ve got a marketing company and we’ve got the coaches and we’ve got all that and it’s, it’s been a journey for sure but I am so thankful. You’ve been on that journey with me because you have brought so much value and so much, uh, so much awareness to comprehensive exams with our students and the people that come to take the programs and I just have to say, I’m super proud of you. I, I really am, you know, a lot of guys, you know, say they’re going to do stuff and it just doesn’t quite work out and I understand all that too, because everybody’s got their thing, but you’ve been a staunch supporter of PDA and of course, John Corley’s for a long time. And, uh, but thank you so much for being on the podcast with me today.
[00:20:26] Dr. Wade Kifer: Oh, it’s been fun. I was a little nervous, but you always make it easy.
[00:20:28] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: Well, we just, all we do is talk about stuff we know and then we’re there. So anyway, for those of you listening, if you have any questions or anything for Wade, uh, send it to
[00:20:40] Dr. Wade Kifer: Yeah, drwadekifer@yahoo.com Just use that email.
[00:20:43] Dr. Bruce B. Baird: That’s, that’s great. Yeah, that would be awesome. So all right guys and thanks for voting us the number one podcast last year. We’ll see what happens this year, uh, this past year, this year, uh, coming up. So, uh, you know, good luck and have fun way. Thanks for being on with me. Have a good one. Thanks, buddy. Thank you for joining me for this episode of the Productive Dentist Podcast. If you found this episode helpful, make sure you subscribe, pass it along to a friend. friend. Give us a like on iTunes and Spotify, or drop me an email at podcast@productivedentist.com. Don’t forget to check out other podcasts from the Productive Dentist Academy at productivedentistpodcast.com. Join me again next week for another episode of the Productive Dentist Podcast.
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