Dr. Julia Hartmann grew up in Wickham, eleven minutes from where the practice now sits, and had a genuinely bad first dental visit at age five. She has said, more than once and to more than one reporter from the Cedarfield Ledger, that this is the entire reason the practice exists.
Brightburrow opened in March 2016 on the second floor of the Alder Mill building with two operatories, one hygienist, and Rosa at the front desk. There are five operatories now and Rosa is still at the front desk. Dr. Marco Delgado joined in 2021. A second office in Stonebridge opens in January 2027.
What we actually do differently
There are three things, and they are all small.
Nobody gets held down. If a child is not ready, we stop. We note where we got to and we try a different way at the next visit. Some children take three visits to get through a first exam, and that is a completely acceptable outcome that costs nobody anything except a little scheduling.
You see what we see. Before we recommend treatment we put the photograph or the x-ray on the screen and show you. “Trust me, it’s there” is not a reasonable thing to ask of a parent who is about to spend money and put their child through something.
Rosa tells you the number first. Benefits are verified before your visit, not billed and reconciled afterward. When the number is bad, you hear it before you sit in the chair rather than in an envelope six weeks later.
The beaver
His name is Bramble. He was carved out of a single piece of black walnut by the grandfather of a patient in 2017, delivered without warning, and set on the corner of the front desk where he has been ever since. He gets dressed up for Halloween and for graduation season.
The mural in the hallway came later, painted by a local artist over four evenings after the office closed.
The burrow
The wooden tunnel in the waiting room was supposed to be temporary. Nine years and several thousand children later it is still there, and it has been repainted once.
Where we sit in the community
We see children from Cedarfield, Stonebridge, Millbrook Heights, Elmore Park, Wickham, and Northvale. We take Ohio Medicaid through CareSource and Buckeye and we do not cap how many Medicaid appointments we schedule per day, which is a policy choice and not an accident.
Dr. Julia sits on the dental advisory committee for the Cedarfield school district and runs the sealant day at Cedarfield Elementary each September. Kelsey does the kindergarten classroom visits, which she volunteered for and now cannot get out of.