Author: John Cotey

The image is still seared in the minds of many who grew up a generation ago:

The dentist, seemingly 10-feet tall in a white lab coat, white mask over his mouth, ominously standing over you, his hand clutching some archaic metal tool with sharp tips, spinning drills and rotating saws, cackling as he moves in to take care of your teeth.

This scene, most noticeably from the “Little Shop of Horrors” but perpetuated as a stereotype over the years, is laughable nowadays.

Walk into Children’s Dentistry in the Cory Lake Professional Center on Cross Creek Blvd., and you are greeted by comfort, warmth and smiling faces. Children are given choices, like a daily game at the front desk that usually involves guessing, say, the weight of a pumpkin, and there are video games and toys and The Disney Channel awaiting every child. The affable Dr. Greg Stepanski, who earned his Doctor of Dental Surgery (DDS) degree from the Ohio State University College of Dentistry in Columbus, and also has a B.S. degree in Biology from the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, IN, punctuates every visit with professional and expert care wrapped around a boisterous laugh and calming nature.

“It’s fun here,’’ says Nicole Trailer, one of Children’s Dentistry’s ambassadors, and she should know. Long before she joined Stepanski’s practice as marketing director in 2014, she was his patient for more than a decade.

In fact, Nicole says, it’s usually the parents who are nervous, when they recall their own visits to the family dentist decades ago.

“This wasn’t always the experience,’’ Nicole says. “Nervous parents remember back in the day when it was this terrifying experience. But today’s kids, they don’t know anything about that.”

Familiarity, in this case, breeds excellent customer service. While dental care is about keeping teeth healthy and strong, those first few moments a child – and in some cases, a parent – steps foot in the office may be most important of all.

Patients and children are greeted by over 100 years of combined experience. Melanie Phillips, the office manager, has been with Children’s Dentistry going back 28 years, when Dr. Stepanski purchased an existing pediatric dentist office on E. Fowler Ave., “he got me as part of the deal,” she jokes.

Twenty five years later, including the last 13 at the Cross Creek Blvd. location, Melanie runs an office of dental veterans. Shannon Carithers has been with Children’s Dentistry 25 years, one more than Brenda Cromwell, and Erica Resendez has worked with Dr. Stepanski for 17 years. Meanwhile, other Children’s Dentistry staffers, like Maria, and Becky, are relatively new but another generation of happy smiling faces you’ll meet at the office of “Dr. Greg.”

“It’s like family here,’’ Melanie says. “Some of our patients have been coming to us since they were 2 and through the age of 21, and now we are actually seeing their kids. They really like the comfortable and happy environment we work to create.”

Lenore Mumaw has been taking her three children to Dr. Stepanski since he was on Fowler Ave. She jokes that Dr. Stepanski and his staff know her middle son, Corey “quite well.”

During his first basketball game in seventh grade, Corey’s front tooth was knocked out. Dr. Stepanski met the Mumaws in his office that night after the game, around 9 p.m., and managed to save the tooth.

“He still checks on that tooth,” Lenore says. “It has gone through a lot.’’

Dr. Stepanski is easy going and funny, and during a tour of his office he quips about the signed Elliot Johnson Tampa Bay Rays baseball jersey on his wall (“I think he got traded the week after I got that.”), points out a signed Prince tennis racquet (whose strings have been wrecked by his kids hitting a football with it) signed by former women’s professional tour player (and Wesley Chapel resident) Jennifer Capriati and jokes that he and his staff may need to seek treatment at Disney Channel Anonymous.

The office has a pristine salt water tank, always a hit with the kids, with water so clear it looks clean enough to drink (the secret, he says, is trading out the artificial corals on a regular basis). And if that’s not enough to entertain, there’s always the woolly mammoth baby tooth he keeps on display.

Dr. Greg, as many of his young patients call him, explains every step of the process to the parents. He uses digital x-rays, which he switched to in 2002, because it offers lower doses of radiation. Children’s Dentistry has an in-house laboratory, “so when you order a custom appliance, you know it fits because we make it here,” he says.

And, he treats children as children, not small adults, a touch many parents appreciate.

“I guess we just try to treat people and families how we would want to be treated,’’ Dr. Stepanski says.

It‘s difficult to imagine Dr. Stepanski not treating children. It’s a calling he discovered when he started seeing children at the Rainbow Babies and Children’s Hospital during one his residencies at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, OH, and having grown up with a brother with Downs syndrome, Stepanski had a built-in touch with treating people with special needs or requirements. “It just clicked,’’ he said.

While studying in Ohio, he met drama student Bob Miller, and the two became fast friends. Miller runs a business that specializes in characters for events and business. For Children’s Dentistry, Miller flies down from Ohio every February during Dental Health Month, and he visits local schools as Tommy the Toothbrush, a character who stresses good dental hygiene.

Dr. Stepanski, an avid fisherman, runner and biker, remembers one time when he joined Tommy at a school in Ohio, and young kids got a little out of control and rushed the big blue toothbrush. “He looked at me and yelled ‘Run!’”, Stepanski says, his laugh filling the office.

Tommy the Toothbrush is part of Stepanski’s outreach into the community. Recently, Tommy spoke to the kindergarten classes at Dr. Richard F. Pride Elementary, deftly keeping the children engaged while singing songs about brushing and flossing. Every student received a gift bag from Children’s Dentistry.

Dr. Stepanski is a charter member and past president of the New Tampa Noon Rotary Club, and is an active church member at St. Mark’s The Evangelist Catholic Church and a fundraiser for Corpus Christi Catholic School in Temple Terrace, where his wife Sue has taught kindergarten for 15 years.

The couple’s three children – Maura, Mike and Brian – all graduated from Tampa Catholic High. Maura spent time in Afghanistan and is a Bronze Star recipient with the U.S. Army, and the helping the military is one of Stepanski’s favorite causes.

Even the most scarred parent would have an almost-impossible time imagining Dr. Greg as that towering, ominous dentist from their childhood, standing over their child with metal tools and spinning drills. “I couldn’t have handpicked a friendlier, more kid-friendly pediatric dentist office,” Lenore says. “No matter when we go in there everyone is in a great mood.”

For appointments and more information about Children’s Dentistry (10317-B Cross Creek Blvd.), call 973-3100 or visit DrGreg-ChildrensDentistry.com. Most major dental insurance plans are accepted.