THE HOUSE OF WELLNESS

For Daniel and Natalie Tan, investing in longevity practices isn’t just a smart business move, it’s a lifestyle. Hannah Gay travelled to the pair’s one-of-a-kind dental practice in Launceston, Tasmania to witness the meeting of progressive holistic treatments under a single roof.

DR DANIEL Tan, BDS (Adel.) undertook study in dentistry in Australia, making the move from his Malaysian hometown to complete the fiveyear course. Today, he’s the face of his namesake clinic located on the rolling hills of Launceston. Natalie Tan, a former social worker and the wife of Daniel, serves as the business’ visionary. As Dan’s right hand, no business move is left uninspired by Nat, down to the finished product of months of building renovations. The ultimate power couple, the pair have built the business from scratch, all while raising two daughters.

The pair met in 2011 and went on to establish Dr Daniel Tan & Associates (DDTA) in 2016. Founding DDTA came about as a seamless extension of the pair’s own health-driven way of life. Facing a health scare some years prior, Nat had engaged in a low-tox lifestyle now embraced by the pair; one that “completely changed their lives”.

“The medical world is not a preventative world… we can support our own bodies, and that became an obsession,” Nat shared. “We've removed all toxins from the home. We don't have a microwave. We wake up in the morning and have pure electrolytes we fly in from the U.S., trace minerals in our water, hydrogen tablets, an infrared sauna at work, another infrared sauna at home, an ice bath that we would do every single morning…”, the list goes on.

Dan’s personal appeal and unique set of principles have remained a drawcard to DDTA for his adoring patients. “People wanted to follow what he was doing, learn from him. He was sharing podcasts and educating his patients.” A dental clinic first, now just one of many business offerings. “I can introduce things that I’m really passionate about and actually see how they translate,” he said. Following dentistry came the sauna, then the skin clinic.

It’s this multi-faceted approach to client care that singles DDTA out from local competition. And while similar wellness centres may be scaling in the major cities, Dan cites Tasmania’s appreciation for quality over quantity.

The Space

Visiting DDTA feels much like swinging by the in-laws’ place for a ‘cuppa. Its team of specialists appear more like extended family to their regulars, with Dan noting up to three generations are often patients of the clinic at any one time. Its spacious reception area has a cosy, home-like feel. The intentional omission of stark white walls in place of earthy tones and

warm lighting make for a welcoming haven - a reflection of the active, outdoorsy lifestyle of Launceston’s locals. Its ageing population takes great appreciation in bushwalking, fresh air, clean food and water.

The centre’s main building sits adjacent to a former 1940s army barracks. After long holding out hope, the team acquired the neighbouring building when the time was right to expand. That buildingwhich they’ve named Barnstead - now serves as DDTA’s skin clinic, dental lab, and space to house their newly acquired wellness devices. A team of three operate out of the skin clinic - a dermal therapist and two registered nurses.

More recently, the pair extended the main building, crafting a curved walkway fit for the pages of an architectural magazine. Additional rooms house DDTA’s team of six dentists, a clinical nutritionist, ayurvedic practitioner, and wellness coach.

The Services

Down to the tools and solutions used in-treatment, Dan’s approach to dentistry is entirely holistic. Fluoride is omitted, instead working with nano-hydroxyapatite (nHA), containing natural mineral that makes up the majority of tooth enamel and bone. No uncomfortable scraping of teeth is necessary. In its place is a powder-water solution dispersed by an Airflow device to provide a deeper clean to the gums and pockets. Because of this approach, Dan often receives referrals from other allied health practitioners for his use of non-harmful materials. “I’d deal with those patients very differently because they’re already in tune.”

A teeth clean and check with Dan can take little more than five minutes. But rather than send patients on their way, Dan utilises his expertise to address any other oral-related concerns held, referring onto other specialists who can assist with addressing the root cause. Despite onboarding a full house of specialists, Dan disagrees with trying to appease everyone in-house. “Because then the business model comes in… how much rent you can pay… what you can do. I don't want that. I just want to know of people doing what they're good at, and to be comfortable in the environment they're doing it.”

Approaching a skin concern is an involved process. Oftentimes, a client will be referred for gum testing, with results passed onto a functional nutritionist. Simultaneously, that client will be referred to DDTA’s skin experts for topical support. It’s an approach that seeks to provide the client with a well-rounded and thorough diagnosis.

WE WERE THE FIRST TO DO THIS,” DAN CONTINUED. [WE’D LIKE] TO MAKE THIS ACCESSIBLE… GIVING PEOPLE ACCESS TO PROPER HEALTH… SO IN FIVE YEARS PEOPLE IN TASSIE ARE GOING TO LOOK BACK AND THINK ‘WE SHOULD HAVE DONE THIS’.

“Skin came about because I was doing a lot of Botulinum toxin for clenching,” Dan said. “I was offering it for pain relief, but eventually people would ask ‘what else can I get’?” He recognised that while a connection had developed between dentistry and the cosmetic world, there was no one on hand to fill the essential skin gap. And while cosmetic treatments are on offer at the business, the pair don’t consider themselves players in the cosmetic game. “[Our skin team] is very passionate about the work that they're doing and not overdoing or over-treating. We're not a heavy filler provider because our skin team prefers rejuvenation, which is great because that really fits with us,” Nat explained.

RATIONALE is Dan and Nat’s brand of choice for skin rejuvenation in-clinic, given they were using the brand themselves; “we truly believe in the product”, Nat said. The clinic also stocks ingestible brand, IMBIBE and utilises the OBSERV skin analysis system to round out its skin health offering. “We keep it simple, because otherwise, no one will use [the product]; no one will follow anything that’s too complicated,” Dan continued.

The Wellness World

Dan and Nat know how to walk-the-walk when it comes to wellness. “Anything you see in the practice, we will be using ourselves,” Dan admitted. And while terms like ‘wellness’ and ‘biohacking’ fuel public discourse, the pair haven’t been led by the trends, but have rather sat at the forefront of community acceptance and excitement. “People worship Dan,” Nat added, “so as soon as we bring in a wellness modality, everyone jumps on board. We’re very lucky.”

Compared to major cities like Sydney and Melbourne, the pair see that preaching wellness is easier with so much Launceston space and scenery to complement that lifestyle. As a result, their core client demographic is middle-aged and looking “to work on themselves”. DDTA intentionally omits marketing before-and-after images of their clients, believing in client comfort first and instead leaning on word-of-mouth to vouch for the clinic’s results. Dan insists on honesty and respect, choosing not to prey on his clients’ vulnerabilities in the face of ill-health. “For us, integrity is everything,” Dan said. “I don’t want to be everywhere, I just want to do my thing. I want to live my life knowing that I’ve gone through this journey; I’ve created something and I’ve helped people. That’s all I want to do.” Dan often rejects the question of ‘what do you think I need?’, in favour of encouraging the client to lead with their concerns, before suggesting a treatment plan.

DDTA has placed major investment into biohacking-centric treatments, with the introduction of a hyperbaric chamber and TGA-approved full body red light bed to their clients. The latter - coming in at an eye-watering cost of $200,000 - is designed to assist clients with chronic pain, amongst other things. “It feels good to help people,” Dan shared. Investing in devices is simply a matter of “getting the right one”. Of less significance to Dan is the ROI a device offers, instead preferring to invest in what he’d want to use personally - a philosophy he connects to the entirety of the DDTA brand. “It’s past that point of business ventures. I want people to know that we have done something that everyone can benefit from.”

Client loyalty is solidified in their commitment to living a wellness-centric lifestyle, Dan argued, for a single, one-off treatment will never achieve the results a long-term habit can.

“When you get to the point of mastering meditation, sleep patterns, you have put in a lot of commitment to be able to get to that point.” Achieving optimal gut health, on the other hand, is considered a lifelong journey, as the body continually adapts to the introduction of new foods. “They always say a good business model is when you correctly deal with your existing patients, because they are the ones that will continue supporting you, where the new ones will come and go.” Once your lifestyle has changed, he continued, you become obsessed. Because of this mentality, nearly every one of their clients is considered a regular.

The Importance of Education

Despite the city’s appreciation for wellness-based pursuits, Nat sees that the public remain largely uneducated when it comes to the breadth of wellness offerings at clinics like DDTA. “You get your pockets of people who know exactly what you're doing, what you're offering, but we're educating people all the time.”

Dan added, “people are not understanding there's so much in-between [the current mentality around wellness] that we can do to maximise that.”

Dan used the ice bathing trend as an example, suggesting without the right education, people can in fact, overdo it. “My job is to make the connection and make them understand what's happening, because if everyone understands why something's happened, it becomes a lot easier to then manage. Without knowing ‘the why’, how do they take initiative [to fix it]? It's all about balance. I think it's great that we now have this information overload; everyone has something to think about, has something to say. Our job is to make sure that we keep everyone safe and give them the right information,” Dan says.

Next on the agenda for DDTA is simply: refinement - from hiring new staff, to crafting a more seamless cross-referrals process. “And also just getting the word out there,” Dan said. Nat added, “we just really want to educate people and to bring the experts in from overseas.”