10 Under 10: Humble start cleared path to career for Massachusetts dentist

Andrew Tonelli, D.M.D., didn’t exactly get swept up into dentistry, but the process did involve some sweeping. His first dental office tool actually was a broom.

He and his brother as kids helped keep things tidy at their father’s dental practice in North Reading, Massachusetts, when there was a cleaning staff vacancy.

“I was 12 years old or something like that,” Dr. Tonelli said. “I don’t remember very well. But, yes, [it was] every morning before school. … I started at the bottom in a janitor position.”

Dr. Tonelli is now a partner in practice alongside his father, Steven Tonelli, D.M.D., and two others, Mark Webster, D.D.S., and Brian Crowley, D.M.D., at Dental Health Concepts in North Reading, Massachusetts. He has achieved such laurels in his young career that he was named among the 2023 ADA 10 Under 10 Award winners for his accomplishments.  

His path to dentistry came by way of a detour through the possibility of a career in international relations. While immersing himself in culture and language in Europe, the choice of dentistry crystallized.

“The story is that I was actually on a train in Spain, and I just decided,” Dr. Tonelli said. “I was studying abroad, and I was trying to figure out what I was going to do with my international relations and Spanish degree. I thought about dentistry and all the things that kind of logically fit for me as something that would fit my personality and skills and something that I would want to do for a long time and be able to have a hold of my own destiny.”

 

The allure grew stronger when he considered how dentistry is the sort of profession that could provide a pathway to owning a business.

“It’s always something that I had an awareness of, and I knew what my father was able to achieve for his family through dentistry,” Dr. Tonelli said. “So, when I got to the point where I really needed to interrogate what I wanted to do with my life, using my hands and interacting with people and patients, being an office owner — all of those things appealed to me. So, that’s what I did.”

Aside from what his father achieved through the practice of dentistry, there was the intrigue that comes with dentistry on a day-to-day basis.

“There are so many ways you can challenge yourself in dentistry, so many things as a practice owner, leader and clinician — all at the same time,” he said. “You’re never going to be bored, that’s for sure.”

Aside from practicing, what keeps Dr. Tonelli hopping are his impassioned efforts to effect positive changes for patients at the local level. One issue he champions is dental insurance reform.

“I found an article from like 1977 that said the average insurance amount for a dental plan was $1,500,” Dr. Tonelli said. “Now, plans are usually $1,500 or less. So, that amount in 1977 would be almost $6,000 today. That’s a significantly more beneficial plan, and that’s the trajectory things have been on over time, where people are getting less for their plans. The price of it has stayed pretty stagnant. Meanwhile, the cost of dentistry has gone up, and the insurers are taking more money out of the system for themselves.”

 

During the 2022 election season, Dr. Tonelli was front and center working with the ADA and Massachusetts Dental Society on the Massachusetts Dental Care Providers for Better Dental Benefits campaign committee and its "Vote Yes on 2" campaign. He assumed leadership and spokesman duties and handled several radio and written media appearances. He even helped to secure a Boston Globe endorsement. These efforts contributed to Massachusetts residents voting overwhelmingly for a new law to establish a medical loss ratio standard for dental insurers. Dr. Tonelli continues to work on implementation of the law.

“People have a sense that things aren’t getting better in terms of their coverage,” Dr. Tonelli said. “It’s just gotten worse over time. You don’t really need to study to show you that. It’s out there.”

A 2014 graduate of Tufts University School of Dental Medicine, Dr. Tonelli completed a general practice residency in 2015 with NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center. He is the immediate past chair of the Boston District Dental Society and immediate past co-chair of the Government Affairs Committee of the Massachusetts Dental Society. He foresees more activism on the horizon as his career matures.

“There will always be the desire to give back to the profession and advocate for the things that I think are best for dentists, dentistry and dental patients,” he said. “I think it’s getting a lot harder for particularly young dentists to have the kind of careers that made me want to go into dentistry in the first place because of the changing economic structures and health care systems in this country. I think that’s something that’s motivating to me. That’s something I’ll still be engaged in but on a more practical level in the near future.”

 

Heightening patient happiness ranks high, too, in how Dr. Tonelli sees his career evolving in his next phases as a clinician. He derives particular satisfaction from helping eradicate pain from his patients’ lives. He often works on temporomandibular joint disorder cases.

“To have somebody who has been uncomfortable for a long time, when you treat them correctly, to not have that discomfort anymore is really rewarding for sure,” Dr. Tonelli said. “Obviously, it’s pretty powerful, the tools that we have now, and to change people’s smiles, that can be very affirming and kind of cool as well. The classic thing in dentistry is ‘who wants to go to the dentist?’ so when you can get a patient more comfortable in their bite, their life and in their smile, all of those things are super rewarding.”

Outside of dentistry, Dr. Tonelli enjoys skiing with his wife, Alexandra. They particularly like to ski in Vermont with family and friends.

“We’re hoping to do that more,” he said. “It’s hard to get out there. That’s something that when we get a chance and some free time, that we really like to do. We’ve got a couple of dogs in the mix, so being outside with them and going skiing is what I like to do.”