Narayana Hrudayalaya Dental Clinic (NHDC) is investing Rs 150 crore to set up a chain of clinics across the country. The funds will be raised through debt and internal accruals.
The NHDC, which commenced operations in 2008, has seven clinics of which six are in Bangalore and one in Kolkata.
“Our expansion plans will see us open 300 clinics by 2013 across India and abroad. This will ensure dental facilities coming up across localities in the cities allowing easy and quick access to dentists,” Dr Nitish Shetty, managing director, Narayana Hrudayalaya Dental Clinic told Pharmabiz.
In the West, primary dental care is provided by the government hospitals, but in India it is the individual dentists offering the same. In India 98 percent of the segment is ‘dentist-entrepreneur-driven’. Since dental health is of critical importance going by its impact on cardiac diseases and diabetes, there is a need to expand dedicated facilities in the country. “Therefore our initial expansion plan is to roll out 30 clinics in Bangalore and Kolkata in the next six months,” he added.
Currently, in Bangalore alone there are 6,500 dentists and 3,000 clinics. There is a market for this specialty. Although the focus of expansion is metros, in the phase II, NHDC will look at Tier II cities to help the patients have access to uniform quality care. Going by the scale of operations, NHDC is tipped to emerge as the largest player in dental care in the country, said Dr Nitish.
According to market reports, global dental care industry is estimated to be around US$ 18 billion and the dental equipment is pegged at US$ 15 billion with a CAGR of 5 percent and 4.5 per cent respectively.
In India, the dental care services market is estimated to be US$ 600 million with a CAGR of 10 per cent over 10 per cent since 2000 and its equipment sector valued around US$ 90 million. The key growth driver in dental medicine is the growing awareness and interest towards need for healthy teeth and dental cosmetics. Over 80 percent of the revenues generated for NHDC, since it commenced operations is from the aesthetic dentistry space, he said.
Dental tourism forms 10 per cent of total Indian medical tourism, projected to grow at 30 per cent to Rs 9500 crore by 2015. India produces more than 18,000 dentists annually from 283 dental colleges. The country has around 1,500 oral and maxillofacial surgeons.
The General Dentist Concentration, according to Dr Shetty is one dentist for every 30,000 persons. While Urban concentration indicates one dentist for every 10,000 persons for the Rural areas it is one dentist for every 250,000 persons.
The Oral Disease Prevalence in the country indicates that over 80 per cent of children and 60 per cent of adults suffer from dental caries. More than 90 per cent of adults in the age-group of 30 years suffer from periodontal diseases.
Dental surgeons in India perform a number of Cranio Maxillo-Facial Surgeries primarily because of the high incidence of congenital abnormalities affecting around 35,000 babies. Around 35 per cent of children suffer from mal-aligned teeth and jaws. Further, Decayed Missing Filled Teeth (DFMT1) score for teenagers is 2.4 and for 35-40 age-group is 5.4. In addition, over 17 per cent of the aged population are edentulous, the remaining 78.3 per cent have some teeth missing.
Narayana Hrudayalaya Dental Clinics plans a chain of centres in Malaysia soon
Narayana Hrudayalaya Dental Clinic (NHDC) a wholly owned subsidiary of Narayana Hrudayalaya Hospitals, has drawn up plans to open a chain of dental clinics in Malaysia. In this regard, it has commenced discussions with dentists in the country to enter the region.
“We had been exploring possibilities in the South East Asian region and commenced our efforts with Malaysia although we are keen to enter into Indonesia too. There is a huge market potential and an awareness on prevention and immediate care among the population, Dr Nitish Shetty, managing director, Narayana Hrudayalaya Dental Clinic told Pharmabiz.
Earlier NHDC had announced investment plans of Rs. 150 crore to open its 300 clinics which would also cover its international foray.
In Malaysia, the dental speciality is primarily an offering by government hospitals. The government of Malaysia has put a blanket ban on government doctors carrying out private practice. Therefore, lack of private clinics is causing serious difficulties for people who suffer from dental diseases. Not only that dental clinics are accessed by working people during evening hours and the paucity of centres is resulting in a major medical care crisis, he added
“Two factors are driving the need for a dedicated dental chain in Malaysia. One is the inability to access dental centres because cavities or any tooth problems cause considerable pain and require instant access to dentists. We intend to replicate the clinic chain model on similar lines of India which is currently proving to be practical. We could be ready to commence operations in Malaysia by early 2011”, stated Dr Shetty.
NHDC, which commenced operations in 2008, has seven clinics of which six are in Bangalore and one in Kolkata. By the end of this month, efforts are on to increase to 30 clinics in the country and in the next two years, 270 out if its planned 300 clinics will be opened in Hyderabad, Pune, Delhi and National Capital Region. The effort is to ensure easy and quick access to dentists.
Dental tourism forms 10 percent of total Indian medical tourism, projected to grow at 30 per cent to Rs.9500 crore by 2015. The Oral Disease Prevalence indicates that 80 per cent of children and 60 per cent of adults suffer from dental caries and more than 90 per cent of adults above 30 years suffer from periodontal diseases proving the indispensability of this speciality, he said.
For more information: info@hrudayalayadental.com
