Clear Choice Dental Lawsuit: Carroll Case, Claims, and Ownership

Patients across the country have filed lawsuits against ClearChoice Dental Implant Centers alleging botched implant surgeries, extraction of healthy teeth that could have been saved, and a sales process that locks people into financing before a dentist ever examines them. There is no certified class action against ClearChoice, and most resolved cases have ended in private settlements in which the company denied wrongdoing.¹

What the Lawsuits Allege

Claims against ClearChoice fall into three overlapping groups. The first is standard dental malpractice: misaligned implants, inadequate anesthesia, and painful complications that required corrective surgery elsewhere. The second is unnecessary extraction, with patients alleging that ClearChoice dentists persuaded or pressured them to have healthy, treatable teeth pulled to make way for a more expensive full-arch implant procedure. The third targets the sales process itself, with plaintiffs alleging they met first with a non-dentist “patient education consultant” who obtained a financing commitment before any clinical evaluation.¹

Maryland dental malpractice attorney Fred Goldberg, who has represented at least six clients who sued ClearChoice, said his clients reported these salespeople “almost always” recommended extraction of all natural teeth.² ClearChoice has stated publicly that full-arch implants are a “well-accepted standard of care” for patients with severe tooth loss, that all clinical decisions are made by licensed dentists or specialists, and that its private equity ownership does not influence treatment.³

The Sales Process Patients Describe

A recurring thread across the lawsuits is the order in which patients say things happen. People respond to advertising promising a “new smile in as little as one day,” arrive at a clinic, and meet with a salesperson rather than a dentist. According to reporting from multiple outlets, these salespeople secure financing commitments, sometimes for loans reaching $65,000 over ten years, before any clinical exam.¹

ClearChoice disputes this characterization and says it employs at least one oral surgeon or prosthodontist at each center.³ Reporting on the broader industry has noted that at some large implant chains, more than 70% of clinics listed only general dentists with few or no specialists on staff.¹

The Becky Carroll Case

The most visible active suit was brought by Becky Carroll, a New Jersey woman who paid $31,000 in 2021 for a full-arch upper implant procedure at a ClearChoice clinic. Carroll alleged her anesthesia wore off during surgery, leaving her conscious while teeth were extracted and titanium screws were placed in her jawbone. She said the resulting prosthetic teeth were so misaligned with her lower teeth that she could not chew for more than two years.⁴

Carroll also alleged she was directed to a salesperson who pressured her into financing the procedure before she saw a dentist, and she later paid out of pocket for corrective surgery at a different clinic.² Independent dental experts who reviewed her case concluded that less invasive alternatives should have been explored.⁵ ClearChoice denied all allegations of malpractice and negligence in court filings, and as of mid-2026 the case remains pending.⁴

Other Cases and How They Have Resolved

In New York, Brenda Black sued over a restorative implant plan performed between July 2022 and November 2023 at a ClearChoice location operated by Metro New York Dentistry, PLLC. Her treatment involved upper arch replacement surgery, lower dentures, and multiple prosthetic adjustments, and she sought corrective care. In November 2025, a Kings County judge allowed her to add three individual dentists as defendants and remove Aspen Dental Management from the caption, applying New York’s continuous treatment doctrine.⁶

Gloria Gomez sued Dr. Felicia Wilson and ClearChoice in New Jersey over implant procedures done at a Fort Washington, Pennsylvania clinic between August 2016 and March 2017. Her case moved through several rounds of jurisdictional dispute before a New Jersey appellate panel dismissed it in April 2024, finding that the state lacked personal jurisdiction because the surgery took place in Pennsylvania.⁷ That outcome is a reminder that where the procedure happened matters.

Other individual suits have quietly resolved. In a 2021 Maryland case, a patient alleged ClearChoice “convinced” her to extract eight healthy upper teeth by “greatly downplaying the risks.” In a 2023 Florida case, another patient alleged ClearChoice extracted all her teeth without offering any alternative and called the procedure “totally unnecessary.” Both were settled privately, with ClearChoice denying wrongdoing.¹

The Complications Behind Many Claims

Many ClearChoice suits involve the All-on-4 procedure, which replaces an entire arch of teeth using four implants. Published clinical data shows implant survival rates between roughly 92% and 99.6%, but survival is not the whole picture. Biologic complications affecting the tissue and bone around the implant occur in roughly 19% to 26% of cases, and mechanical complications such as framework fractures or prosthetic wear affect 7% to 37% of patients, according to a 2025 review in a dental industry journal.⁸

Common reported problems include fractures of the prosthetic bridge, infection with bone and gum loss around the implant, gum recession that exposes the hardware, and bridges that feel bulky or interfere with speech.⁹ These complications form the factual basis for many malpractice claims, especially where patients allege they were not warned of the risks before consenting.

Who Owns ClearChoice

ClearChoice was founded in 2004 and is headquartered in Greenwood Village, Colorado. A Sun Capital Partners affiliate acquired it in November 2017, when it operated 39 centers across 22 states.¹⁰ In November 2020, Aspen Dental Management acquired ClearChoice in a deal valued at more than $1.1 billion.¹¹ Aspen Dental is itself owned by three private equity firms: Ares Management, Leonard Green & Partners, and American Securities.¹² Attorney Edwin Zinman has argued that this layered ownership creates a business model that prioritizes short-term profit and contributes to overtreatment.¹ ClearChoice now operates nearly 100 locations nationwide.

Is There a Class Action

No. As of 2026, no nationwide class action, coordinated federal litigation, or settlement fund exists against ClearChoice. The legal picture is a patchwork of individual malpractice suits filed state by state, with ClearChoice typically denying wrongdoing and, in resolved cases, settling privately. Anyone considering a claim is bringing an individual case, and where the surgery took place will shape both the applicable standard of care and which court can hear the suit.

1
Katie Couric Media. Dentists Implants Scam Investigation ClearChoice
2
Chicago Sun-Times. Dental Implants Dentists Pulling Healthy Treatable Teeth
3
Ars Technica. More Dentists Are Pulling Healthy Teeth to Sell Pricy Implants, Experts Warn
4
KFF Health News. Dental Implants Investigation Failures Unnecessary Healthy Teeth
5
Vice. Woman Couldn’t Chew for 2 Years After Horror Dental Surgery, She Says
6
Findlaw. Brenda Black v. Aspen Dental Management, Inc., et al.
7
Law360. NJ Appeals Court Tosses Suit Over Painful Dental Implants
8
Decisions in Dentistry. Beyond Survival Rates to True Success With All-on-4 Implants
9
American Academy of Implant Dentistry. All-on-4 Dental Implant Problems and Complications
10
Sun Capital Partners. Sun Capital Partners Affiliate Agrees to Acquire Dental Implant Leader ClearChoice
11
PE Hub. PE-Backed Aspen Dental Buys Sun Capital’s ClearChoice in $1.1Bn-Plus Deal
12
Private Equity Stakeholder Project. Private Equity Health Care Acquisitions November 2020