Dr. Stephen Cuchel, co-founder of state's first dental HMO, dies at 83

Dr. Stephen Cuchel believed first and foremost in good people providing good service to more good people — and that is how he and a classmate built New York State’s first, and still prospering, dental health maintenance organization, initially focusing on unions.

"I think he was both super-creative and a visionary — and it was just the right match at the right time, for people without great benefits," said his daughter Natalie, of Roslyn.

Said Peter Meringolo, chairman, New York State Employee Conference, who also led New York City’s Correction Captains Association for 18 years: "I’d like to come back as his son."

Referring to Cuchel and his partner, Dr. Martin Kane, Meringolo continued: "I don’t think there’s a union person out there that used his company that didn’t have a good — a great — word to say about them."

Born in Brooklyn on Oct. 5, 1938, Cuchel died at his Roslyn Harbor home on Dec. 14, his family said. He was 83 and had suffered from Parkinson’s and dementia. His partner, Kane, died in 2015.

Family was a priority, especially when it came to leisure time and trips, which in later years included grandchildren and great-grandchildren, his daughter said, often to faraway, horizon-expanding places, from Egypt to India to Kenya to the Amazon. His daughter also recalled somewhat less glamorous outings, such as to union conferences.

"When his grandchildren were at his home he held story time in the gazebo, built toys with them in his woodshop and played for hours in their beautiful garden with electric cars, sleds and the golf cart," a family statement said.

"He will be remembered by all who knew him as a family-centered, fun-loving and generous man who appreciated travel, fine art, food and wine, mystery novels and the beach," the statement added.

Saluting his philanthropy, which benefited the Nassau County Museum of Art and NYU Dental School, the family also noted Cuchel occasionally embellished his own stories.

"Those of us in his immediate circle will also remember him as a man who could tell the tallest of tales with a straight face as his audience accepted each word as truth."

After graduating from Schenectady's Union College in 1960 and obtaining his dental degree from the NYU College of Dentistry in 1964, Cuchel worked as an oral surgeon from 1965 to 1975, his family said. He practiced dentistry in Valley Stream, Huntington and East Harlem.

Cuchel knew at once that he had met the love of his life when Sharon, whose son’s errant baseball had chipped a tooth over the weekend, walked into his office, his daughter said.

"He described her walking in, saying the moment she walked in, he knew he was going to propose to her."

Cuchel and his partner and dental school classmate Kane founded a dental network in 1977 that grew into Uniondale-based Healthplex, Inc., according to his family and company statements.

One decade later, their firm, which also offered traditional insurance, encouraged its dentists to concentrate on preventive care through prepaid plans, Cuchel told Newsday.

Network dentists were paid 85% of the premiums, averaging $2,000 to $3,000 per month, for treating about 150 patients. "The dentist wants to maintain his patients in the best possible health," Cuchel said, to reap more profit for their work.

Those same prepaid plans were a bargain for their members, he said.

An individual paid $95 a year while a family — of any size — paid $250, he said. That fully covered everything, from cleanings to simple extractions. The national average fee for traditional dental insurance was $35 a month — or $420 a year for a family — but they only partially reimbursed patients.

By the time Healthplex was sold to MCNA Dental in 2019, it employed more than 500 workers, and served 225 labor unions and municipalities and 3,000 businesses, for a total of 2.4 million subscribers, according to company documents.

Two years later, MCNA Dental was sold to United Healthcare. Sale prices were not disclosed.

Profit margins, at least while Healthplex’s swift growth spiked administrative costs, were slim, Cuchel told Newsday in 1987. "But we are operating at $15 [million] to $20 million a year, so even five percent is good."

Said Meringolo: "He obviously could have made more money not doing it that way, but he really wanted to support labor."

In addition to his daughter and widow, Cuchel is survived by daughter Karen Cuchel; stepchildren Chris Schmidt, Tim Schmidt, Jane Casale; sons- and daughters-in-law Jason Dubow, Pascale Schmidt, Barbara Schmidt, and Sam Casale; 11 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren.

A memorial service will take place at a later date at Whitting Funeral Home in Glen Head, his family said.