CVS Health moves into dental care

Drugstore chain to offer teeth-straightening service

Associated Press

CVS Health is venturing into dental care with plans to offer a relatively new teeth-straightening service.

The drugstore chain said Thursday it will add SmileDirectClub locations to hundreds of its 9,800 stores, where customers can start getting their teeth straightened without an in-person visit with a dentist or orthodontist, a move that has drawn criticism from orthodontists.

CVS Health and other drugstores have been pushing to add more services to stores, not only to help customers stay healthy, but to attract customers to beauty products and stave off online competition such as Amazon.com, which provides same-day delivery for many products drugstores sell outside their pharmacies.

Under the plan, customers get a 3D image of their mouths made by a SmileDirect employee at a CVS location. The image is sent to a dentist or orthodontist who approves a treatment plan, then patients are shipped removable aligners designed to straighten teeth. They check in remotely with a dentist or orthodontist, often by smartphone. The cost: $1,850 before insurance.

The American Association of Orthodontists criticized the service, warning in-person visits are important in this type of care. Dentists can spot gum disease at visits and X-rays can detect bone loss not seen in a photo, the group’s lawyer Sean Murphy said.

CVS Pharmacy President Kevin Hourican said he has no concerns about safety with SmileDirect, which he said provides a “high quality” product and limits care to patients who don’t have complex dental needs.

SmileDirect spokeswoman Carrie Moore said the company, started in 2014, has served more than half a million people.

CVS Health will add SmileDirect as a covered option in the dental-care network of its Aetna health-insurance business. UnitedHealthcare announced a similar coverage expansion Thursday.

While the SmileDirect locations will appear in only a small percentage of CVS retail stores nationally, company officials say they may eventually expand to more than a thousand locations.

The company started testing the approach in a few stores last fall.