Tooth and Nails

Here’s a word to the wise patient headed to see dentist Lynn Watanabe: Before you go, brush your teeth and wash your feet.

While Watanabe picks at your gums and scrapes plaque off your molars, a massage therapist will be giving your feet a complimentary rub. Think “ah” instead of “ow.”

In a bid to make dental work seem downright pleasurable, Watanabe in May opened Dental Spa, a multi-tasker’s delight offering facials, massages and root canals. Watanabe, 38, believes that the Pacific Palisades office is the first of its kind in California and perhaps the first in the Western U.S.

The business joins a handful of dental practices in New York and Texas that have begun serving up paraffin baths and reflexology--even Botox injections--to entice dental phobes and to improve the experience for plucky regulars. With studies indicating that as many as 12 million Americans balk at visiting a dentist because of fear or anxiety, there’s a potentially large pool to tap.

And where better, patients say, to roll out a drilling-edge dental concept with self-indulgent overtones than the Westside of Los Angeles, home to thousands of bonded and bleached teeth?

“You can’t underestimate the hedonistic and sybaritic qualities of the Californians,” said Harley Jean Kozak, an actress and Dental Spa patient for whom a visit to a typical dentist conjures images of Laurence Olivier’s sadistic probing of Dustin Hoffman’s mouth in “Marathon Man.”

Clients know they are in for a different sort of dentistry from the moment they enter Dental Spa, on the second floor of a wood-sided office building a block south of Sunset Boulevard, with a view of mountains and a nursery.

First, there are the unmistakable strains of “spa music,” those blood-pressure-reducing selections popular in places where patrons get plucked and pampered.

On the counter sits a clear glass pitcher of water, afloat with lemon and lime slices, beside a bowl of plump peaches and a plate of almonds. Candles burn; fountains trickle. A small cabinet displays soaps, lotions and toothpaste, all for sale. About the only thing that brings a dental patient back to reality is the rack of magazines.

A Dental Spa banner lists the usual and the unexpected--all dental services, massage therapy, aromatherapy, facials/cosmetology services, complimentary chair-side massage (hands or feet, take your pick).

“I created this to help transform the industry,” Watanabe said. “I want people to leave here feeling great.”

A 1995 graduate of the University of the Pacific dental school in San Francisco, Watanabe hatched the idea for a combination spa and dental office several years ago with her husband, John Chien, who grew up in Malibu. As they searched for just the right beach community, away from traffic and noise, Watanabe worked as a dentist in several communities, most recently Huntington Beach. She joined the Holistic Dental Assn., based in Durango, Colo., and encountered other practitioners who reaffirmed her belief in a mind-body connection.

Dental schools, in Watanabe’s view, are skilled at teaching students how to use the latest in high-tech gear and techniques, but innovative approaches to reducing patients’ stress are scarce as hen’s teeth. (On its Web site, the American Dental Assn. advises those bothered by the sound of the drill to “try visualizing yourself relaxing on a warm beach.”)

At a seminar on how to open a spa, Watanabe met Carol Williams, an aesthetician--someone who gives facials--massage therapist and self-described dental phobe. Williams agreed to join forces with Watanabe and Toni Marlow, a massage therapist who has also worked with plastic surgeons. Joleen Rizzo, an Emmy Award-winning makeup artist, signed on to provide makeup services by appointment.

In June, Dental Spa became the first of its kind to join the Day Spa Assn., an 8-year-old trade group for about 600 spas, individuals and vendors. So specialized is Dental Spa that Hannelore R. Leavy, the association’s founder and executive director, wasn’t sure how to classify it. So she established a subgroup called the Medical Spa Assn., with about 10 founding members, including Dental Spa, detoxification clinics and other medically oriented services.

“The day spa industry has developed itself as more of a beauty-oriented business,” Leavy said. “Now the really serious spas want to distinguish themselves from the pampering places. We see more and more spas offering total wellness as opposed to just treatments.”

That is precisely what Watanabe had in mind. She wanted to go well beyond the usual primitive relaxation methods--portable audio players or colorful posters tacked to the ceiling.

She and her team recently went to work on Diane Cote, a Pacific Palisades hairdresser who was having her teeth cleaned before moving to Paris.

From the tiny “relaxation room” (a.k.a. waiting area), Cote, who in March completed chemotherapy for breast cancer, stepped into the dental area and settled into a light-green vinyl chair. As Watanabe reclined the chair, Cote looked up at two ceiling panels featuring blue sky and white clouds. The air smelled faintly of tangerine and lavender, released by a candle heating a tiny pool of essential oil in a ceramic holder. On a monitor mounted high on the wall, she could watch a “mood tape” featuring slow-motion scenes of waterfalls and flowers.

Marlow brought out a heated cushion filled with flax seeds that she positioned under Cote’s neck. She then removed Cote’s shoes and began rubbing her feet with massage lotion. As a bonus, Williams massaged Cote’s hands with a salt scrub, removing the remnants with a steaming towel.

All the while, Watanabe was performing the presumed main attraction--a cleaning, for which she uses paste flavored like cookie dough or pina colada. Even with a suction straw in her mouth, Cote smiled.

“It was interesting having all these things going on at the same time,” she said afterward. “When you’re at the dentist, you’re tense. This definitely does distract you from thinking, ‘When am I going to get poked?’ ”

Had she chosen to indulge, Cote could have padded down the hall in white spa slippers to Williams’ facial room or Marlow’s massage room.

Watanabe does not charge extra for her dental services, even with the complimentary massage. A cleaning is still $75. Other spa services are extra.

Dental patients get discounts on spa services, and package deals are available, including for parent and child. A full-body, one-hour massage or one-hour facial is $50 for dental patients or $65 for non-patients. (The summer rate for patients or non-patients is $45.) This month’s special: a full-body massage or facial with teeth-whitening for $350. Each new customer leaves with a complimentary “spa in a bag,” filled with toothbrush, toothpaste and spa lotions or sprays.

Business is picking up, Watanabe said, but so too are the tensions any new business would face, even one dedicated to relaxation. Just last week, Williams left the company, complaining that answering phones, which she was occasionally asked to do, should not be part of an aesthetician’s duties. And on Friday, Marlow, too, said she was leaving over differences with Watanabe and Chien.

Chien said the success of a spa depends on having a closely knit team willing to do whatever is necessary, especially a spa that is trying to build up steam, and not just for facials. He said he and Watanabe hope to hire new employees soon.

If the concept takes off, they hope to franchise it. A San Francisco dental school classmate of Watanabe’s has expressed interest.

Meanwhile, a plastic surgeon for whom Marlow used to work has offered to give wrinkle-reducing Botox injections at Dental Spa, an idea that Watanabe is considering.

The American Dental Assn. hasn’t yet taken a position on dental spas. But the concept is getting some buzz.

“I think it’s kind of innovative,” said Sigmund Abelson, a retired Beverly Hills dentist who directs governance and strategic development for the California Dental Assn. “There would be a certain clientele--in Brentwood or Pacific Palisades--that may want this.”

But the idea will probably appall many old-school professionals, he noted. “Some dentists will look at this and say, ‘Oh, my God, they’re bastardizing this profession.’ I can really see them coming unglued.”