Dental Leaders Podcast

This week Payman chats with Payvand Menhadji, a newly qualified specialist periodontist who's navigating the delicate balance between clinical excellence and impending motherhood.  At 30 weeks pregnant, Payvand reflects on her journey from general dentist to specialist—driven by a competitive streak and a love for surgical challenge that emerged during her VT year.  The conversation weaves through...

In this solo episode, Prav Solanki shares a no-nonsense reflection on business, health, family and personal discipline as he looks ahead to 2026. After a turbulent end to the year involving a family health scare, he talks through the non-negotiables shaping his daily life, from strength and cardio to carving out space for strategy. But the real centrepiece is business — specifically his Start, Sca...

The tables turn this week as Payman hangs out with Laura and Leanna on The Horton Hangout.  What starts as a chat about the challenges of being interviewed rather than interviewing quickly evolves into something deeper—an honest exploration of ambition, sacrifice, and what it means to build something meaningful whilst trying to hold onto the people you love.  From managing business partnerships an...

This week, Payman chats with Niki Keyhani, a newly qualified specialist prosthodontist who's already built something remarkable. Seven years out from qualification, she's opened a squat practice, completed her specialist training at King's, and somehow managed to do both simultaneously during a pandemic.  What really stands out isn't just the clinical achievement—it's the way s...

Richard Porter joins Payman to explore the meeting point of clinical dentistry and psychology.  From his early struggles adapting to London dental school after growing up in rural Kent, to his current work exploring personality psychology and emotional intelligence in practice, Richard challenges conventional thinking about what makes a truly skilled dentist.  He argues that feelings are the curre...

In this episode, orthodontist Zaid Esmail opens up about what really matters in patient care—and it's not just straight teeth.  From calling every patient the week after fitting braces to navigating the tension between NHS pragmatism and private practice perfectionism, Zaid reveals why communication trumps technique every time.  He shares the terrifying moment a patient swallowed a spring mid-...

This expansive and deeply reflective episode features Anne-Sophie Flury — neuroscientist, psychology graduate, former PhD researcher, and wellness educator — whose work bridges hard science with lived human experience. Known online as “Coochie by Gucci,” Anne-Sophie brings rare honesty and intellectual clarity to conversations about the brain, trauma, intuition, and emotional agency. Rhona and Pay...

Chiara Burgio's path to dentistry started with a Parisian psychoanalyst and a ten-minute stare.  What followed was an international training odyssey—from Madrid to Milan, Brazil to NYU—that shaped her approach to aesthetic dentistry.  In this conversation, she opens up about the pull of digital workflows, the art of composite layering, and what it really means to work alongside someone like Ch...

In this episode of Dental Leaders, Payman chats with Deepa Patel, a locum dentist with the unique experience of working inside over 100 different practices. Having held every role from nurse and receptionist to practice manager before qualifying, Deepa shares why the happiest practices aren't always the most high-tech, and why the most profitable dentists aren't always the most skilled. Th...

This week, Payman sits down with Adeel Ali, an implantologist who's taken the kind of risks most dentists only talk about. Seven years qualified and he's already built multiple UK practices, mastered full-arch implantology including zygomatics, and most recently moved his family to Qatar to open a clinic from scratch—all whilst flying back every three weeks to maintain UK commitments.  The...

In this Dental Leaders episode, Payman sits down with Fabian Farbahi, a 22-year-old Sheffield dental student who's already mastered something most people spend decades learning: the power of genuine conversation.  Fabian spends 3.5-hour train journeys striking up chats with strangers because he's fascinated by people's stories—the same curiosity that drove him to become president of Sh...

Nik Sethi returns to the podcast four years after his first appearance alongside brother Sanjay, and what's changed reads like a masterclass in professional evolution.  Now president of BAAD and founder of the Elevate education platform, Nik's story isn't about flashy techniques or groundbreaking discoveries—it's about something far more valuable. He's built his success on a si...

When a slipped disc ends your dental career at its peak, what comes next? Randeep Singh Gill's story isn't about endings—it's about radical reinvention.  A digital dentistry enthusiast whose career was built on precision and routine, Randeep found himself confronting an identity crisis when chronic neck pain forced him away from practice. But here's where it gets interesting: inste...

Best friends Alisha Sagar and Natalie Gabrawi met at King's dental school and have remained inseparable ever since. In this episode, they share their journey from different backgrounds—Alisha's upbringing in Zambia and Natalie's roots in a medical family—to navigating their foundation years together.  Their paths are diverging professionally, with Alisha drawn to implants and oral surg...

Aditi Bhalla's story reads like a cautionary tale about high achievement. A specialist prosthodontist who ticked every box—academic success, specialist training, teaching positions—she found herself breaking down in surgery in 2018, asking the question so many high achievers eventually face: is this it?  After developing De Quervain's tenosynovitis from repetitive movements and stress, Adi...

Alex Buciu's story reads like something from another era. From endodontics in Romania to amalgams in Northern Ireland, his path through dentistry mirrors a deeper journey through loss, resilience and reinvention.  When your mum dies at 14 and you're watching it happen, something shifts inside. When you arrive in a new country with £3,100 in your pocket—half of it borrowed—you learn what ma...

There's something about meeting someone who's truly hungry to learn. Payman spotted it straight away when Sanaa Harroussi walked into his Mini Smile Makeover course—that rare fire in the belly.  But here's the thing: Sanaa's journey from Rabat to Paris to West London isn't just about collecting qualifications. It's about a woman who aced the ORE first time, built a fifteen-...

What happens when a complaint over a scale and polish changes everything? For Alif Moosajee, a GDC investigation became the catalyst that transformed him from a dentist flying under the radar into the owner of Oakdale, one of Leicester's most distinctive private practices.  This conversation charts his path from undergraduate struggles with imposter syndrome through the crucible of regulatory...

Raj Ahlowalia's remarkable 33-year journey in a single practice reveals what true dedication to the craft looks like.  From almost missing university entirely to becoming an internationally recognised authority on functional occlusion, his story challenges everything we think we know about dental careers.  The son of a polyglot interpreter who hitchhiked from India to the UK, Raj stumbled into...

Ashkan returns to reveal how Southcliffe Dental transformed from near-bankruptcy to unprecedented profitability through a revolutionary therapist-led model. From losing half his body weight to facing GDC proceedings, he opens up about the personal costs of rapid expansion and the dark period when £4 million in clawbacks nearly destroyed everything. His ex-wife's intervention during his lowest...

Two Iranian dentists who took the scenic route to British dentistry, Sara Khandan and Mahan Mohaghegh's story reads like a masterclass in adaptability.  From Tehran to Debrecen University in Hungary, then straight into the UK without ever having set foot in the country before, their journey showcases both the challenges and rewards of international dental careers.  Now transitioning from NHS t...

From knife crime in East London to owning one of the capital's most successful dental laboratories, Kash Qureshi's story is one of remarkable transformation.  At just 15, a violent altercation became the catalyst that changed everything, pushing him from a dangerous path towards an apprenticeship that would define his future.  Now owner of Swiss Dent and a thriving denture clinic, Kash shares the...

Shameek Popat takes us on a remarkable journey from his early days as a Ugandan-born dentist to becoming a serial entrepreneur disrupting the oral care industry.  After 23 years of successful practice ownership, Shameek sold to Portman Dental and launched Tooth Angel, a luxury, eco-friendly oral care brand that's challenging the sustainability narrative in dentistry.  Now he's back with Disruptive...

This fly-on-the-wall conversation between Kailesh Solanki and Dev Patel, founder and CEO of Dental Beauty Partners (DBP), captures the remarkable 20-year journey of Kiss Dental, from a risky startup in a Flixton suburb to an eight-clinic powerhouse. Kailesh Solanki reveals how he mortgaged himself to the eyeballs at just two years post-graduation, survived near-bankruptcy, weathered a catastrophic...

Two remarkable women share their extraordinary journey from India to building three thriving NHS practices in the UK. Gauri Pradhan and Shivani Bhandari discuss their innovative therapist-led model that's revolutionising NHS dentistry, creating happy workplaces where staff genuinely want to be.  From navigating the brutal ORE exam process to developing a groundbreaking patient app, they reveal...