Inside Dental Next 2026: A Day Built for the Industry's Hardest Conversations
Most dental conferences are built around booths. Dental Next was built around a question: what is actually next for the dental industry, and who should be in the room when we figure it out?
On Friday, May 1, 2026, Prahsys hosted the inaugural Dental Next conference at Wild Stallion Vineyards in Spring, TX. More than 100 professionals registered, with over 50 staying for the full day of keynotes, panels, and live demonstrations. The audience was anchored by 32 practice owners and clinicians, alongside a curated group of DSO leaders, investors, and technology partners. The room was kept intentionally small. The conversation was not. The day was approved for 5 hours of continuing education credit, giving every clinician in attendance a clear professional return on their time.
A lineup that punched above the room
Dental Next opened with Charlie Wright, Prahsys's Executive Chair, who has delivered keynotes on every continent except Antartica. His session laid out the four macro forces reshaping dentistry in 2026: workforce pressure, shrinking insurance reimbursements, the consumerization of patient expectations, and arguably most important, rising overhead. It set the frame for everything that followed.
CEO Grey Bonin took the stage next with a hard look at the state of dental payments. The average practice now juggles between four and ten disconnected payment systems, a fragmentation problem that quietly costs practices tens of thousands of dollars a year. His session made the case for embedded, integrated payments and walked the room through what that future looks like.
Dr. Gerald Curatola, founder of Rejuvenation Dentistry and one of the most recognized clinical voices on the oral-systemic connection, headlined the clinical track. His talk reframed the mouth as a primary input into whole-body health, an emerging shift that is changing how patients value their care.
The afternoon brought David Harris, the dental industry's leading authority on practice fraud and embezzlement, with a session built around a number that surprises every audience: roughly half of dentists will experience embezzlement at some point in their career, and the average loss exceeds $100,000.
Between the keynotes, Dr. Troy Bonin and Ethan Bonin ran a live demonstration of PrognosiX, Prahsys's AI-enhanced dental imaging technology. A panel on the future of group dentistry brought together Dr. Brian Machart, Dr. Vajahat Yar Khan, and Dr. Troy Bonin. Dr. Yar Khan also led a session on operational efficiency, and Nicole Toudouze closed the marketing track with a look at how AI is rewriting how practices are found online.
Why the room mattered
Dental Next was designed so that owners, operators, investors, and technology partners would still be talking after the slides came down. They were. The cocktail reception and dinner that closed the evening proved the format. Practitioners compared notes with DSO operators across the tables, investors found themselves in long conversations with founders, and a few partnerships started taking shape. The sessions opened the doors. The hours that followed were where the real connections happened.
The day showed what's possible when the right people are gathered in the right setting with the right questions. For Prahsys, it also marked a milestone: a young company, less than two years in, hosting a conference that drew leaders from around the country and across the industry. Year one delivered. Year two is already on the calendar.
PrognosiX is currently in development. Pending FDA Clearance, Not for Sale.
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