NEWARK -- What's in a name?

For Mehrnoosh Moghaddam, it's more agony than a root canal.

Moghaddam opened a dentist's office named Gentle Plus Dental five years ago. But now she must change the name

because another corporation, InterDent Inc., owns a similar federal trademark and threatened legal action.

InterDent uses the name Gentle Dental for nearly all of its dentists' offices -- more than 120 in eight states.

Rather than try to fight InterDent in court, Moghaddam said her office on Thornton Avenue will change next month from Gentle Plus Dental to General Plus Dental.

"Nobody knows me by my (actual) name," Moghaddam said. "From the start of my practice, I've been Gentle Plus Dental. The change is like starting from scratch."

The new name will force Moghaddam to alter stationery, signs, phone listings and bank documents. She also will have to update her licenses at the state, county and city levels and re-register as a corporation.

"It's a long, long process," Moghaddam said.

Moghaddam opened Gentle Plus Dental in 2001 and registered her business in California. InterDent Inc. owned an office in Fremont at the time, but it was called Fremont Dental Group, not Gentle Dental.

Two years ago, Moghaddam said, InterDent changed the name of that office and several others in the Bay Area to Gentle Dental. She received a letter from InterDent's lawyers after the change.

Moghaddam's lawyer, Arthur Curley, said that even though Moghaddam had her name in the Tri-City area first, InterDent's federal trademark was older. This gave the company the right to enforce the trademark once it entered the area.

InterDent lawyers didn't accept the notion that the two

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