Robert Elsenpeter is a freelance writer and frequent contributor to Dental Products Report and Dental Lab Products. He is also the author of 18 technology books, including the award-winning Green IT: Reduce Your Information System's Environmental Impact While Adding to the Bottom Line. As such, he’s particularly interested in the technological side of dentistry.

Евгений Вершинин /STOCK.ADOBE.COM

Not surprisingly, there are a lot of moving parts in a large machine. What may seem simply implemented in a smaller organization—like a single dental practice—might be more complex in a bigger group practice. The same is true when infection control practices are managed in both organizational sizes. While the result should be the same—safety and compliance—how practices with different organizational structures get to that goal can vary.

It all starts with understanding what a Dental Service Organization (DSO)—or “Group practice”—means. There is no, one standard definition. A group practice could be as small as 2 locations, it could be as large as 1,000. Several locations may be governed—very strictly—by a single management authority, or they could just be a lone practice, taking advantage only of the group name and left to their own devices.

“The key issue here is scale,” Shannon Mills, DDS, observes. Dr Mills is a private healthcare consultant and Chair of the American Dental Association Standards Committee For Dental Products (SCDP) Subcommittee on Dental Infection Prevention and Control. “When you say the phrase ‘group practice’, there are so many different variations on that theme. They’re modeled very differently. Some of them provide a whole range of services for the practice, but they leave the practice management up to the practice, themselves. They may set some franchise rules where you must do this, or you must do that. This can be a good thing, as you have organizations that have very rigorous policies, standardizing infection prevention and control safety practices across the entire enterprise.”

Ultimately, what matters is how those infection control methods are put into practice.

“At the chairside, we have a set of guidelines,” Dr Mills says. “We have a set of principles. It’s imperative that each of these practices have an individual who has the training and the understanding of what they’re doing to manage for infection prevention and safety. Sometimes it’ll be more than 1 person. You have a safety person and an infection prevention person in some larger practices, but you must have someone who’s been properly trained with an understanding of the guidelines, understanding of the legal consequences and the licensure consequences of noncompliance.”

For DSOs and group practices—no matter how they are defined—what’s necessary is that safety practices are the same at each location.

“The biggest thing is consistency,” infection prevention speaker and consultant Karen Daw, “

“ advises. “How do you maintain consistency in your safety protocols and policies across multiple sites? Especially as you’re growing, that can be a huge concern and a challenge. Ask, “How do I make sure that my expectations are being met at Site A the same as Site B?” And that’s where either working with a consultant—or at least having the proper checklists and templates—are going to be helpful, too. I also advise my multi-site locations to have a safety point person assigned to each location. They’re not going to do it all. You may have 1 person that’s in charge of overseeing safety for all the sites, and this person might make sure that they schedule the OSHA training for everyone. However, the point person is the eyes and ears of the individual location reporting upwards about safety concerns or suggestions.”

Consistency is necessary because, left to their own devices, it’s not guaranteed that each location is going to deliver the same results.

“Maybe the lead safety person will coordinate events around infection control and safety and bring in different speakers,” Daw says. “But at the individual sites, there’ll be somebody who’s overseeing the safety program, making sure they all are using the same OSHA manual. I’ve walked into some practices where they acquired 2 new locations, and I see that they’re all using different OSHA manuals and different safety systems. And I ask them, ‘How long ago did you acquire these 2 practices?’ And the response was, ‘Oh, it’s been over a year.’ That tells me they really haven’t done anything as far as reviewing their systems to ensure that they’re using the same manual, the same checklist, the same audit procedures, the same training so that everybody hears the same information and understands the expectations.”

Training is a key part of infection prevention and compliance. That is, rules and regulations may or may not change, but team members can fall into bad habits or forget critical parts of the infection control process. Also, yearly training is an OSHA requirement. As such, having someone per OSHA who is knowledgeable in the subject matter perform the training is necessary. At the end of the day, that person will answer to OSHA about the training during an investigation. Why not have someone who focuses on just that?

“Corporate-owned practices might have a full-time person that oversees it, and then they appoint a point person at each location,” Daw says. “What I’m finding in what I call a ‘mid-tier’ or ‘expanding multi-site locations’, is that they don’t really have a full-time person or have a budget or a structure in place to have a full-time person oversee everything for them. So, having a safety committee would be helpful where you have these point people from each location all get together and discuss how they can streamline safety across all locations. What’s happening at Point A that’s not happening at Point B? What do we need to do to get everybody up to par?”

Sometimes practices rely on video or online trainings. And while those trainings are certainly quick and allow them to check off the box that training was accomplished, Daw observes that those trainings may not provide the same quality that an in-person trainer would.

“I see this many times, when they’re doing safety training, they watch a short video just to check off the box and they’re done,” she says. “And that opens them up to huge liability. Growing multi-site locations are still in a position to do team trainings. They might do it virtually, but everybody’s hearing the same information, and it’s a deeper dive on the safety and infection control topics that they need to be aware of. That’s another challenge that I think much larger organizations face. ‘How do we make sure that our continuing education is above and beyond?’

Not only, she says, does that live-person training provide more quality, but it also shows team members that their safety is important to practice leadership.

“When you look at the messaging that you give to your team, if you let them know, ‘Hey your safety matters so much to us that we’ve invested in top line systems and software, we bring in the expert speakers’,” Daw says. “‘We have full-day events where all we do is talk about compliance and safety and subjects that matter to you.’ I think that speaks volumes about what your organization values.”

While group practices may have someone whose whole job is to oversee training, Daw observes that there may be a little too much responsibility.

“A lot of the corporate practices that I’m aware of have a full-time person that’s overseeing the training,” Daw says. “I spoke with one who used to work at corporate-owned dental practices and left. Her biggest concern was that she was constantly under the pressure to feel like she knew everything. She had to do it all. She had to know it all. So, it wasn’t really a culture that encouraged her to seek outside help, to bring in an advisor, bring in a consultant.”

“I’m going to emphasize and reemphasize getting the right training,” Dr Mills adds. “Also, you’ve got to give that individual sufficient responsibility. Say, you’re the infection prevention and control person in this clinic, but we don’t give any authority and nobody in the clinic pays any attention to them. They just talk and everybody says, ‘I’m just going to do whatever I want, because the doc’s not going to make me.’ Then you’re going to have a failure somewhere along the line. There’ll be a breach, whether it’s a little one or a big one.

When one thinks of infection prevention, the things that come to mind are things like surface disinfection, instrument processing, and PPE, but one of the least sexy aspects is recordkeeping. For compliance sake, it’s necessary to keep track of several processes to prove that that work has been and continues to be performed correctly and consistently. The organizational structure of a DSO can make that process more involved, depending on its corporate requirements.

“If the central authority, the corporate headquarters, wants to take responsibility for auditing and evaluating the quality of infection prevention and safety in the practices, they can do that and they can ask them to provide information,” Dr Mills observes. “Send us documentation. Send us your spore testing results. Send us your water testing results, and we’ll keep that centrally. More likely what they’re going to do is what we did in the military—you’re going to do spot inspections. You’re going to audit them.

“For instance, you’ve got a headquarters in Kansas City, but you’ve got practices all over the country,” he elaborates. “You’re going to send either someone out to audit that practice—in Wyoming or South Dakota or wherever it is—or you’re going to ask them to submit documentation on a spot basis to show that they’re compliant.”

As the world moves to more digital recordkeeping, some places are still paper in nature. Group practices will likely require electronic records—as opposed to paper records—for the sake of consistency and efficiency.

“Single practices, I find, are kind of 50/50,” Daw says. “Some of them have electronic documentation, some of them like to use pen and paper, and that’s absolutely fine. If that system works for them, that’s great. It’s a little bit more difficult to have a paper system in multi-site practices. So, they tend to streamline it by going electronically. And that really does work well, because then if you have 1 person in charge of all the records and making sure all the record keeping is getting done, having a shared network folder that you can access across multiple sites is going to make that infection control coordinator’s job so much easier, from a record-keeping standpoint.”

The end goal for both the single site and multi-site practice is the same—safety for patients and team members, alike. But how they get there can be very different.

Articles

The end goal for both the single site and multi-site practice is the same—safety for patients and dental team members, alike. But how they get there can be very different.

Group Practices of All Sizes Need Infection Control Protocols

Lisa Newburger, a master's level social worker supervisor, helps audiences find humor in talking about tough topics. Her "in-your-face" style of presentations and writing will make you smile or just shock you into taking some action. Either way, she is very effective at empowering others to reach their goals and feel better about themselves. Her entertaining workshops are available for national and international audiences. Writing for the dental industry since 2010, she uses an alterego (Diana Directive) to illustrate her points in a sarcastic but effective way. Presentations can be scheduled by contacting Lisa at www.discussdirectives.com/dental.html.

Building Your Confidence as a Dental Professional. Photo courtesy of Photographee.eu/stock.adobe.com.


You know how it feels when you get your first patient or your first job. You had a mixture of excitement and fear? Fortunately, you had the opportunity to gain experience and practice skills in internships. The first patient was frightening for everyone, and I was afraid I would be found out to be a fraud who does not know anything. Can you relate?

 by Sheryl Sandburg. If you have not, I strongly encourage you to buy it or order it from your library. It may change your life. For those of you who are not familiar with the author, Sheryl Sandburg is an incredibly impressive woman who worked up the chains of Google and Facebook to become a power to be respected. She was the Chief Operating Officer at Facebook.

This immensely successful woman talks about her own fear of being found to be a fraud. How is that even possible? This is an “ah-ha” moment that women of every socioeconomic level have aloud because you realize you are not alone. Many women and men live in fear that we will fail. We tell ourselves we are not smart enough. We worry that our boss will figure it out we do not have a clue how to do something. This can be paralyzing but knowing that other women feel this way is immensely helpful.

When you start out, whether it is graduating from a dental assistant program or from dental school, you may not feel confident to take on the world. Instead, you worry. I am here to tell you that you will make mistakes and screw up. Some of these mistakes may seem colossal, but, for the most part, you will not do permanent damage to your patients.

I can hear you now, “Lisa, we get it, we will make mistakes. We will be scared early in our careers. But will we move past this?”The simple answer is yes. You will build confidence by failing! Do we learn from our successes? To a degree the answer is yes, but we learn more from our failures and stressors. This is where the professional growth comes from. When you fail or make a mistake, learn from it, and make sure it does not happen again.

One’s experience and age factors into the equation. The older you get it is easier to know how to manage tricky situations. I am a social worker. When I went through my training, I was assigned my first suicidal patient while still in graduate school. This terrified me and caused terrible insomnia for weeks. I somehow stumbled my way through the first counseling session being nervous, but I survived it. She also survived me. At 21, I was young and naïve. My supervisor ended up spending numerous sessions processing the experience with me. As overwhelmed as I felt, I learned a lot because I knew I was not alone. I had backup. You have backup. You have a team that will help teach you what you need to know. Just make sure you ask.

The next time I had another suicidal patient, I was still anxious and still sweating bullets. Immediately following that session, I met with my supervisor and hashed that session out as well. It was a little easier on my nerves but still incredibly stressful. Time passed and I had more challenging patients to deal with. I made a lot of mistakes. But I gained increased experience and knowledge. My confidence level grew. It got to the point where I felt that no matter who walked into my office, I could manage whatever they brought. I realized that I may not have the answers, but I know where to get them.

What about you? Have you ever felt like that? Felt that someone would find out you were a fraud? Were terrified when you had your first patient? You are not alone. Did you make mistakes and then learn from them? If so, welcome to the club. Do not beat yourself up over it. Even if the doctor or patient gets angry. You are learning. You are doing the best you can.

Confidence grows with experience and failures. If you just keep trying, are willing to ask for help, and learn from each challenging experience, your confidence will flourish.

We all make mistakes. Do not beat yourself up over it. Learn from it and make sure you do not make the same mistake twice. There are no shortcuts to getting ahead of it. Only experience, guidance, and a willingness to learn from your mistakes will get you over the finish line. You will be someone who may start out with the imposter syndrome and go on to do remarkable things just like Sheryl Sandburg. Just take it 1 mistake at a time.

Share with me your thoughts on the book or how you developed your confidence. 

No one begins their career as a dental professional knowing everything. Learning from mistakes and leaning on peers for help can build your confidence in the field. 

Building Your Confidence as a Dental Professional

MouthWatch Opens Nominations for Annual Teledentistry Innovation Awards


Teledentistry and intraoral imaging group MouthWatch has opened nominations for its 4th annual Teledentistry Innovation Awards, “The Tellies.” The Tellies were created to recognize innovative and unique teledentistry applications as well as the dental providers who implement them, according to a press release from MouthWatch.

There are 4 categories in which practices or practitioners can be nominated: dentists, hygienists, oral health programs, and educational institutions. Candidates can be nominated for multiple categories when appropriate.

The Tellies are a commitment to appreciating telehealth applications regardless of platform, according to MouthWatch CEO and Founder, Brant Herman.

“We’re excited to recognize this year’s pioneers and innovators,” Herman said in the press release. “Our goal is to shine a light on the many benefits of teledentistry, no matter which platform is used—The Tellies are open to all who are using telehealth technology in dental settings to enhance the standard of care, increase access to providers, and improve oral health for the untreated and underserved.

All nominations, including self-nominations, are now open until September 15th, 2022, on 

. Winners will be announced November 25th through the 30th, 2022, at the Greater New York Dental Meeting.

The 4th annual Teledentistry Innovation Awards, known as “The Tellies,” are now accepting nominations for effective and innovative teledentistry implementation. 

MouthWatch Opens Nominations for Annual Teledentistry Innovation Awards

The software will now include Artificial Intelligence functions and an expanded dental implant library.

Owandy Radiology Inc. has recently upgraded its QuickVision 3D Implant Planning software. The software will now include Artificial Intelligence (AI) functions and an expanded dental implant library.

With this new AI functionality, QuickVision 3D is able to auto-match .dicom and .STL files to easily create customized surgical guides, according to a press release from the company. In addition, Owandy has been expanding the number of implant manufacturer libraries within the QuickVision 3D software, which now includes brandings such as Bicon, Dentsply Sirona, Nobel Biocare, and others.

“Owandy’s new intuitive AI platform, extensive implant library, and open architecture enables QuickVision 3D to be used with any 3D intraoral scanner on the market to enhance the digital workflow capabilities and overall efficiency of virtually any modern dental implant practice,” Owandy spokesperson Boris Loyez said, according to the press release.

Owandy Adds New Updates to QuickVision CBCT Software 

With its 4.2 Upgrade of the Ceramill Mind and Ceramill Match software, Amann Girrbach is now offering dentists and dental technicians entirely new opportunities for the in-house fabrication of restorations—including the ability to process titanium materials.

From now on even titanium materials can be processed in-house with the Ceramill Matik, which in turn results in external cost savings of up to 40%, according to the manufacturer. Another highlight is the new speedlining mode, which enables grinding and cutting of block materials in little time. Additionally, users can now plan dentures directly on the implant and completely without an abutment.

With the Ceramill Mind and Ceramill Match 4.2 software, users are able to provide their customers with next generation in-house fabrication while significantly reducing costs. The in-house fabrication of titanium-based implant-supported restorations lowers costs dramatically. The entire milling unit is said to be able to be financed in full by even a small number of cases.

Another new feature is the innovative speedlining mode: with the aid of specifically developed tools, users of the Ceramill Matik, Ceramill Motion 3 and Ceramill Motion 2 can "cut-grind" hard block materials at full speed. Dentists and lab technicians thus benefit from almost 50% faster production while maintaining optimal restoration quality and reliability.

Another new feature is that the planning of dentures can now be performed directly on the implant and without abutments—regardless of whether single crowns, multi-part bars and bridges or full dental arches are involved. This innovative implant solution is the result of a cooperation between Amann Girrbach and Tri Dental Implants. With matrix, Tri Dental Implants has launched the first approved dental implant specifically designed for digital fabrication technologies such as CAD/CAM milling or 3D printers. With the matrix concept, Amann Girrbach now offers its customers a fully comprehensive CAD/CAM-compatible implant system in both a digital and validated workflow. Implant-based Zolid zirconia crowns can be produced in less than 2 hours in combination with the Therm DRS sintering furnace.

In addition to the fully digital and validated Amann Girrbach workflow for printing implant models and laboratory analogs, the upgrade also offers numerous other CAD/CAM functions. For example, these include the AI-assisted design of bridges using the "Instant Anatomic Morphing" feature or the implementation of the Smile Creator Report in PDF format. This allows patients to see the expected result in advance in a before-and-after comparison and to participate in the planning process if they so wish. In addition, the upgrade also offers quick to perform quality checks with the aid of the new nesting visualization: this makes it possible to repeatedly check whether a restoration can be milled successfully. Additional process reliability can now be created with just a single click. However, as the digitization of production increases, so does the output of milling units and 3D printers. To stay on top of things, the Ceramill System now enables milled and printed restorations to be marked with notes.

"With the upgrade of our Ceramill Mind and Ceramill Match software to Version 4.2, we are yet again focusing on the core principles of in-house fabrication and by doing so, also on the vision of Amann Girrbach. We are delighted to have come a great deal closer to this vision now with the new features, improvements and functions," explains Nikolaus Johannson, Head of the Global Business Unit Lab CAD/CAM at Amann Girrbach.

The rollout of the software upgrade started at the end of June and was expecyed to be implemented worldwide by the end of July. In parallel, Amann Girrbach will be offering users free online training.

Titanium machining at highest restoration quality, high-speed processes and innovative denture planning without abutments part of 4.2 upgrade of the Ceramill Mind and Ceramill Match software.

Amann Girrbach’s Software Update Brings Next Generation In-House Dental Fabrication Processes

If the Internet has given us nothing else, we can at least be entertained for the seemingly never ending supply of top 10 lists it provides. Some lists are, of course, better than others.If there’s a topic out there that you’re interested in, you can be reasonably certain that there is a top 10 list to support it. The best lists have some sort of objectivity – that is, they are not just lists reflecting one person’s opinion. That is what we strive for in our annual top 10 cities for dental lab technicians.

We started by looking at the US Bureau of Labor Statistics’s data which gave us the top-earning cities in America. But the cost of living varies depending where in the country one lives. For instance, things like food, housing, and discretionary spending are more expensive in San Francisco, California than they are inCharleston, West Virginia. As such, we added the AdvisorSmith Cost of Living Index as a factor in the calculations.

However, there is more to life than just making money (nationwide, dental lab technicians earned an average of $39,090 in 2021). That’s when we started adding such factors as overall economy, public safety and so forth.

Cost of Living Index (this is a ratio comparing the cost of living in a certain area to the national average. Some areas are more expensive to live in than others, so the lower the COLI, the less expensive it is to live in an area.)

Stress (including work-related, family-related, money-related and health and safety-related stress)

Included, where available, is information about the total number in that profession for the community. Nationwide, there were a total of75,200 dental lab technicians in 2020.

In addition to BLS, we refined our rankings from personal finance website Wallethub.com, U.S. News & World Reports’s Healthiest Communities study, and data from Centers for Disease Control for life expectancy, by state.

We compiled all the rankings and then honed the list from there. Whoever got the lowest score earned the highest position on the list; whoever got the highest score, well, we talk about them also.

With any top 10 list, there is a natural inclination to ask, “If those are the best places to live and work, where are the worst?” We scrolled to the end of the list to present the following:

Here is the annual list of the top 10 and bottom 5 cities for dental lab techs to live and work in 2022.

The Top 10 (and Bottom 5) Cities for Dental Lab Technicians in 2022

Vivos Therapeutics Will Host 4th Annual Breathing Wellness Conference in Cancún


Sleep experts Vivos Therapeutics has announced its 4th annual Breathing Wellness Conference to take place in Cancún, Mexico, from October 26th through October 29th, 2022. Hosted by the educational branch of Vivos Therapeutics, The Vivos Institute, this wellness conference will focus on obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) and the variety of complications it can cause down the line, including heart disease and dementia.

To hone this focus, the conference will host 16 speakers, including both dentists and medical doctors, to discuss everything from the origins of OSA to leadership in the practice to insomnia. Along with these speakers, registrants will be able to see firsthand dental sleep innovations that can be incorporated in the practice.

This conference will be a place where collaborative learning can bolster dental and medical knowledge on this common issue, according to Chairman and CEO of Vivos, Kirk Huntsman.

“Our annual Breathing Wellness Conference brings together leading clinicians and researchers from a wide range of healthcare disciplines and serves as a platform where we can learn about the causes and serious health consequences of OSA,” Huntsman said in a press release from the company. “And [to learn about] the latest advances in the world of sleep medicine while continuing to spread the message about Vivos’ breakthrough technology.”

The 2022 Breathing Wellness Conference will take place at the Hilton Hotel in Cancún. 

This annual Breathing Wellness Conference will bring together dentists and medical doctors to discuss and learn about obstructive sleep apnea, and how to help patients fight against it. 

Vivos Therapeutics Will Host 4th Annual Breathing Wellness Conference in Cancún

Toothio Staffing Platform Designed to Match Practitioner and Practice


This new staffing service called Toothio aims to create permanent hiring solutions for dental practices by matching them up with vetted dental professionals. Co-founded by Ian Prendergast, Toothio was created to address the staffing issues that the dental industry faces.

“The idea is that Toothio becomes an extension of your team,” Prendergast said in a press release from the company. “We want your patients to see the same smiling faces over and over.”

Dental practices can create an office profile to help Toothio find the best fit for whatever that practice needs. The practice then posts a shift and its pay rate, and then Toothio will do the rest, matching the dental practice with the right dental professional to suit their needs. Toothio handles payment and taxes. Toothio professionals can be utilized on a full-time basis, making it more cost effective than hiring full-time.

“When you factor in the cost of W2 overhead we are by far the most cost-effective option that does not include the cost of job ads, interviews, training, or turnover.” Prendergast said in the press release.

At the end of the shift, the dental practice can rate the professional based on performance and can then add them to be considered for future shifts. This platform is available now online at 

Toothio will help dental practices find the right dental professional to suit their needs while also handling payment and taxes. 

Toothio Staffing Platform Designed to Match Practitioner and Practice

Penn Dental Medicine Study Examines Microrobotics in Endo


Researchers from Penn Dental Medicine and its Center for Innovation and Precision Dentistry (CiPD) have released a study that examines the use of microrobots in endodontic treatment. During the root canal, these microrobots can reach the root canal’s surface to treat biofilm or receive samples for diagnostics.

Microrobotics are comprised of iron oxide nanoparticles that contain catalytic and magnetic activity. The magnetic field controls an aggregated microswarm that disrupts and retrieves biofilm on the surface of the root canal. The study also examined helix-shaped microrobots that were magnetically guided inside the root canal to dole out bioactives released on site.

“This technology offers the potential to advance clinical care on a variety of levels,” Co-corresponsding author Dr Michel Koo said in a press release from Penn Dental. “One important aspect is the ability to have diagnostic as well as therapeutic applications. In the microswarm platform, we can not only remove the biofilm, but also retrieve it, enabling us to identify what microorganisms caused the infection. In addition, the ability to conform to the narrow and difficult-to-reach spaces within the root canal allows for a more effective disinfection in comparison to the files and instrumentation techniques presently used.”

This study was done using 3D printed tooth replicas and mixed species biofilm containing endodontic bacteria. Microrobots were tracked in real time using an intraoral scanner, an X-ray, and cone beam computed tomography. This allowed for a visible maneuverability, according to Chair of Penn Dental Medicine’s Department of Endodontics, Dr Bekir Karabucak.

“Importantly, we demonstrated in an ex vivo model that the robots could be controlled by the magnetic field without interrupted by the soft and hard tissue surrounding the tissue,” Dr Karabucak said in the press release. “In addition, they showed tremendous maneuverability from the top to the bottom of the canal.”

These microrobotics could have a variety of uses in home care and other modalities, according to Dr Koo.

“From disinfecting medical devices like catheters to ensuring clean water lines, this technology holds the potential to transform areas far beyond dental medicine.” Dr Koo said.

Microrobotics studied at Penn Dental have the ability to disrupt biofilm on root canal surfaces as well as move inside the root canal to disperse bioactives. 

Penn Dental Medicine Study Examines Microrobotics in Endo

There are currently more than 200,000 dental hygienists in the United States of America – and that number is only expected to grow. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) expects another 23,000 jobs within the next 8 years—a number, they say, that is going to grow faster than average. With that in mind, it might be a good time to look at which communities are best—and maybe not be so hot—to find a job.

There are a lot of factors that go into establishing which are the best and worst communities for dental hygienists to live and work. Certainly, money matters. But while dental hygienists certainly have a strong level of compassion for others, they still have bills to pay. When evaluating cities’ merits, we have to look at a host of factors.

We started by looking at the BLS data which gave us hygienists’ salaries based on city or region. But the cost of living varies depending where in the country one lives and works. For instance, things like food, housing, and discretionary spending are more expensive in San Francisco, California than they are in southern West Virginia. As such, we added the AdvisorSmith Cost of Living Index as a factor in the calculations.

However, there is more to life than making money (nationwide, dental hygienists earned an average of $77,810 in 2021). That’s why we started adding such factors as the overall economy, public safety, and so forth.

Included, where available, is information about the total number in that profession for the community. Nationwide, there were a total of 206,100 dental hygienists in 2021.

In addition to BLS data, we refined our rankings from personal finance website Wallethub.com, US News & World Reports’ Healthiest Communities study and data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for life expectancy by state.

Top 10 (and Bottom 5) Cities for Dental Hygienists in 2022

With any top 10 list, there is a natural inclination to ask, “If those are the best places to live and work, where are the worst?” We crunched the numbers at the end of the list to present the following:

Bottoms 5

Here is the annual list of the top 10 and bottom 5 cities for dental hygienists to live and work in 2022.

