If you run a general dentistry benchmark against an endodontic practice, you'll get the wrong answer every time. Endodontics runs differently: fewer, higher-value procedures, a referral-based patient pipeline, and different staffing needs than a general practice. Comparing your overhead to a general dentist's benchmark tells you nothing useful.
What "good" looks like for an endodontic practice
A well-run endodontic practice should target total overhead below 58 percent of collections. Inside that number, staff labor typically runs 26 to 32 percent. If your overhead is meaningfully above 58 percent, that's not automatically a crisis, but it is a signal worth investigating before it becomes one.
Where the extra percentage points usually hide
In practice, the gap between a benchmark practice and an over-budget one rarely comes from one big line item. It's usually a handful of smaller things stacked on top of each other:
- Staffing that doesn't match volume. Front desk and clinical staff levels set for a busier (or slower) season than the one you're actually in.
- Supply costs that were never renegotiated. Vendor pricing that hasn't been revisited in years.
- Equipment leases and service contracts that quietly renew at higher rates.
- Facility costs that made sense at a different point in the practice's growth.
None of these show up as a red flag on a P&L unless you know what to compare them against.
Why this matters beyond this year's tax bill
Overhead that's a few points above benchmark doesn't just cost you this year. It compounds. A practice running 8 percent over the endodontic benchmark on $1.2M in revenue is leaving roughly $96,000 a year on the table. Filed correctly. Never flagged. Multiply that across a decade and it becomes the difference between retiring on your terms and working longer than you planned to.
It also shows up if you ever get a call from a DSO. Buyers underwrite your practice against the same kind of benchmark. If you don't know your number before they tell you theirs, you're negotiating from behind.
How to check your own number
You need two things: your actual overhead percentage, broken into major categories, and a real endodontic benchmark to measure it against, not a general dentistry one. If you don't have both in front of you right now, that's the gap.
We built a free 30-minute benchmark review for exactly this. No documents, no prep. You leave the call knowing where your practice stands against the endodontic benchmark, not a borrowed one.