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Office Visit: The Key to a Great Night's Sleep Benjamin Lund, Editor, Orthotown Magazine

More by this author (119)
Getting to know Dr. William Schackel, an orthodontist who has been practicing in Santa Fe,
New Mexico, for 30 years.

by Benjamin Lund, Editor, Orthotown Magazine

Welcome to the fourth installment of Office Visit, where we visit a Townie's office and profile his or her equipment, office design or unique practice philosophy. If you would like to participate or nominate a colleague, please send me an e-mail at ben@farranmedia.com.

This month, we spent some time with Dr. William Schackel, a long-time orthodontist at his brand new Straight Teeth Limited practice in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Dr. Schackel talks about his new facility, his policies on treating family members from referring dental practices and allowing parents back in the treatment area, and finally, the key to a great night's sleep.
Name: William A. Schackel, DDS
Graduate from: University of Missouri – Kansas City
Year graduated: 1972
Practice Name: Straight Teeth, Ltd.
Practice Location: Santa Fe, New Mexico
(satellite offices in Taos and Los Alamos)
Year when this office opened: 2008

Office Highlights
Bonding Agents
• Ortho Solo from Ormco
• Virtuoso Flowable from DenMat

Brackets/Wires
• Ceramic brackets
• GAC In-Ovation R Brackets
• GAC's Sentalloy
• Speed brackets

Cements
• Intact glass ionomer


Click Here To View Dr. Schackel's Top 3

Class II Correction Appliances
• Rapid Pallatal Expansion
• The Herbst Appliance
• Twin Block

Class III Correction Appliances
• Reverse-pull headgear
  (with early treatment)

Impression Material
• Dentsply's imprEssix Alginate
Dr. Schackel, why did you choose orthodontics as your career path?
I was a general practitioner in the Army for five years. I was thinking about specializing but I wasn't sure about what specialty to go into. I went to the Chicago Dental Society Midwinter Meeting and I met up with two of my old classmates who had started orthodontics. We got to talking over an adult beverage and I admitted I didn't know anything about ortho. Orthodontics was kind of a secret then. As dental students, we didn't get as much ortho training as we did other specialties like endodontics. Learning orthodontics takes a long time because actual orthodontic treatment takes a long time – not like, for example, a root canal. It's hard to teach ortho in an undergrad dentistry program. The U.S. Army was starting to train orthodontists and I applied for the orthodontic residency and was accepted at the University of Missouri – Kansas City. From there I had an ortho residency, and afterward, I was assigned by the Army to work in Alaska for three years and Oklahoma for two years and stayed an extra year to let my son graduate high school. Since then, I've been in Santa Fe for 30 years. Orthodontics is what I was meant to do. You change your patients' lives forever; the job satisfaction cannot be beat!
What is your practice philosophy? How do you cultivate this philosophy in your practice?
We go out of our way to show all of our patients how much we care and appreciate having them in our practice. Let's say you have a teenager who was insecure and introverted because he or she has a lot of crowding; when the treatment is over, there's this psychosomatic change from the ugly duckling to the beautiful swan and you're part of it. That's the best job satisfaction you can get. You looked at them when they were 12 years old and introverted with crooked teeth and now they're 15 and they're outgoing. It's such a positive thing.
Dr. Schackel (center) and his team.
Tell me about the orthodontic competition in your area?
There are four other full time practices in the area. Friendly competition is healthy. People certainly have choices but with any competition you need to offer something a little different and unique.

So, what sets your practice apart from the other orthodontic practices in your area?
Our entire staff is committed to excellent patient service and care. The second patients walk in our front door, they are greeted and welcomed. That's unusual in our town! Around here, people aren't nice to you in the service industry. When I hire people to work for me, the key thing is they must have a good personality. I can train them to do anything I need them to do, but they have to have a nice personality. "You've got the nicest staff around," people say. Aside from having a great staff, before-and-after photos of previous patients give you credibility. We go the extra mile. I know that's a trite statement but we really do. The majority of my patients are patient referrals – not dental referrals. Out of every three new patients we see, two of them are referred by a friend or family member of theirs that I've treated. We've made a lot of people happy.

Tell me about your new office. What sort of impact has it had on your patients so far?
Our new facility sets us apart as well. I bought everything new when I opened the new office aside from the braces and wires. My office is now nicer than my house! It revitalizes you and makes you look even more forward to coming to the office. It took about a year and a half from planning to finish. It'll be a great thing in terms of bringing a new person in and transitioning and retiring. I learned a lot from visiting other orthodontists' offices. One feature that's been a real home run here has been our Internet café. We have two new wireless laptops for our patients to use, and even when their appointment is over they don't leave. The architect who did the interiors is from Argentina and we have all of these warm colors – reds, yellows, a color scheme you'd never envision in an office. It doesn't feel like a dental office. It's the nicest office I've ever seen. You walk in here and you feel good. It makes patients receptive. Dad might not want to put $5,000 in junior's teeth, but the warmth of the office makes him more receptive.
Since you began your career as an orthodontist,
what are the three biggest changes you've seen
in the profession?
Direct bonding, nickel-titanium (NiTi) archwires and pre-adjusted brackets. NiTi wires are so gentle and they're so thin. It's remarkable how much they change teeth without too much adjustment. I don't know that young orthodontists today appreciate what they have to work with compared to 15 years ago.
Dr. Schackel's Internet Café.
What piece of technology has the biggest "wow" factor for your patients?
Everyone comes in and wants to do Invisalign. I've finished hundreds of Invisalign cases and there are some
cases that are too difficult to treat with it. It can be difficult to convince someone wanting Invisalign to try another treatment plan. I welcome second opinions, but you can't treat everyone with Invisalign. The more experienced
you get with it, the more you realize its limitations.

How do you market to new patients?
We have our own bottled water with our own Schackel label and logo on it in the beverage waiting room. We have referral slips. I'll have my staff do "muffin or bagel runs" and we'll target different potential referring dental offices. My wife, Toni, who is also our office manager, really has her finger on the pulse of our marketing efforts and has come up with a lot of new ideas moving forward. You never want to neglect the dental staff or hygienists because they're doing the majority of the referrals. You want to thank those staff people. My treatment coordinator will also take other office managers to lunch. I've already read discussions on Orthotown.com about how much of a discount you give referring offices. If I'm treating a dentist's child, I'll treat him for free and that usually pays off
in spades.

What if you're treating a staff member from that office?
There's the dilemma. Do you treat that person for free? Here's what I do: I'll treat the dentist free, the hygienist I'll treat for 50 percent off and then for other employees, like a receptionist or an assistant, I give them $1,000 off. And here's what I say to the staff member, "It's important that I get patients from Dr. Gibbs' office and I really appreciate you referring too. Because I know you'll do that, I'll give you a $1,000 discount." That's what I've worked out over years of trial and error.
Treatment Coordinator Stacey Martinez.
In your current practice situation, what is a typical day's schedule?
I like to do my retainer checks early or late in the day. With retainer checks it's another source for new patients. I don't charge for retainer checks. You bring mom back and say to her, "Let's see where Sam started," and you show mom the picture of where her child started. Some people don't like to have parents back and that's just silly. You're missing the whole PR aspect of your practice. You've got to involve them. If you're open, you'll get a lot of referrals. I want the parents back to develop the relationship.

Then the starts are going on. I've always done instant starts where you've done the initial exam and you're deciding you're going forward. I don't do study models anymore (unless it is an orthognathic case) and I haven't done them in the last 15 years. The academics would attack me, but I document everything. I probably save myself $20,000 to $30,000 a year in overhead. Some orthodontists will read this and think I'm a lunatic, but you have to be comfortable. In two visits you can have the braces on. There is a possibility you might have to take teeth out, but we always try to treat it with a non-extraction.

What is the most unique treatment plan you've put together?
Some of the orthognathic cases when both jaws are moved have been pretty unique. When you look at some patients who have these gross facial deformities, it's like their jaws are from two different people. You have to have access to a great oral surgeon. You have to be very careful that the oral surgeon can actually move these jaws in a precise and predictable manner. When it's done right it's the most remarkable thing in dentistry.

What is the most rewarding experience you've had as an orthodontist?
Every time we take off a patient's braces. We remove braces on Tuesday mornings and when we take braces off we make it a big celebration. There are other patients in the room who can see this thing going on and it's another internal marketing move that people who are getting started or are in the middle of treatment can see and get excited about.

In your opinion, what is the biggest problem orthodontics faces today and what do you think should be done about it?
Probably some cases that are treated without enough experience. The easy part of orthodontics is putting on the braces. Finishing the case is the hard part. I know there are a lot of gurus out there selling ortho to the GPs, and that's fine – there are a lot of teeth out there, you can't straighten them all! But, if you're going to start doing orthodontics, you have to be able to see it through from start to finish. You're going to practice this area for the rest of your life and you're going to see your failures coming back to your office every six months. You have to keep your failures at a minimum. Retention is difficult. Lower teeth crowd up whether you've had braces on or wisdom teeth out. I love what I do as much today as I did 30 years ago. I've seen it all and I know how to handle most problems that occur in our profession. I have the answers now. I know how to make people happy. And if you make people happy, that's how you can sleep great at night.
Orthotown Magazine
September 2025
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