Conveniently located south of Lake Sammamish, a golf stroke from Costco and Value Village, Sunrise Dental has been my go-to dentist for 4+ years. Facility is fairly clean with Covid protocols in place, is well equipped with modern technology, but lacks a lab of its own to produce crowns and the like. On that note, figure an additional $250 lab fee for each crown or other work that needs to be outsourced (pet peeve #1). Parking lot can be a pack of sardines at times (peeve #2) with cars blocking cars blocking delivery trucks, etc.
Service is quick and methodical but personnel can be pushy (#3) with "needed" services, e.g. mouth guards, fillings, crowns, quadrant/deep cleaning, accelerated 4-month cleaning cycle, etc. As an incentive they offer free teeth whitening kits with each appointment. However, they tend to be out of stock most of the time (#4), will often ask you to pick them up the next time around.
Once seated and dental X-rays & photos are taken you'll get a moment to chill and admire the beautiful water feature outside if you're facing the right (south) direction. They might lend you a pair of plastic sunglasses to shield the glare from overhead. If so, be mindful to wipe them first as they tend to be grimy (#5) from prior use.
While you wait you just might imagine a doctor in the back checking on your X-rays remotely, taking notes and drawing up a laundry list of recommended services for the hygienist to relay back to you. To ease your nerves, try envisioning said doc with pinky on lip, fluffy cat in lap à la Dr. E--or whatever else tickles your fancy.
As often as not they'll encourage you to get extra work done the SAME day (if you have the time) or by the end of the year (if time is nigh to use up remaining insurance). But be warned, corners might be cut if you do too much at once (#6). Case in point, once I agreed to a couple of crown impressions, after which they ran out of time to do the cleaning; hygienist was called away to assist somebody else-so I only got 1/2 a cleaning done for which they billed me in full anyway. Almost a moot point since insurance covered it, except that my half-cleaned teeth didn't fare very well at the next cleaning when they practically berated me for then having excess stains and buildup (#7).
Consider your options carefully, including fluoride treatment. The latter seems to be little more than a squirt of ordinary Listerine fluoride mouthwash available at the drugstore (#8). Though covered by insurance, I for one would rather spend the money on something (or nothing) else.
Be sure to ask for itemized receipts as there have been errors (#9) discovered in billing: charges over the patient's share, charges for declined services, etc. Could be an honest mistake, or two, or three. They said overpayments would be automatically handled by the system, but not so. You need to do your own due diligence: go over your insurance statements and compare against your Sunrise Dental receipts. If you find a discrepancy, it's on you to let them know and get a refund for the difference.
Even if they agree to a refund of an overpayment, they may insist on waiting until AFTER they receive their insurance money (±2 months hence). Off the top of that they may ask to deduct a 3.9% credit card merchant fee (#10). All of this is rather aggravating and insulting because: (1) they overcharged you in the first place; (2) they kept your money for months; and (3) now they want to deduct their merchant fee. In fairness, I was able to convince them not to pass their merchant fee onto me since it is just part of their own cost of doing business. As if I needed to explain that to them.
All told, it's been a real albeit rocky ride going to Sunrise for as many years. With the latest billing fiasco, though, I've concluded it's high time to spit out the superfluous overpriced fluoride and move on. Hard to say if I would've gotten better service or spent less out of pocket elsewhere, but there's definitely room for honesty and integrity in the quaint little space that is Sunrise Dental of Issaquah. Best wishes to you if you decide to come or stay. read more