Dental Hygiene

Disclosure: This video is sponsored content from Heartland Dental as part of our sponsored partner program. Not all DSOs are the same. Machell Hudson, RDH, FAAOSH, and I discuss Machell's experience working for a Heartland Dental supported practice and how Heartland supports hygienists through mentoring, professional growth, and continuing education.   If you are interested in learning more about open positions within Heartland...

Some hygienists would like autonomy working separately from the traditional dental practice and without the restrictions of a governing body, dentists, who have control of our clinical careers. We may feel limited in what we can say, the use of our skills, or our value as dental hygienists are not completely tapped into. Are we missing the opportunities to elevate...

Disclosure: This article is sponsored content from Designs for Vision as part of our sponsored partner program. The mere thought of how I ever practiced my dental hygiene career without loupes is unfathomable. Loupes have assisted me in my career by improving my posture, as well as reducing musculoskeletal disorders and hand fatigue. In addition, loupes help perform dental procedures with...

Dystonia is a rare condition that affects about 1% of the population during their daily lives. The condition causes involuntary, repetitive, and violent muscle contractions as well as movements derived from a neurological disorder. Dystonia may cause squeezing or twisting with other movements or abnormal postures. It can happen throughout the whole body and is characterized as generalized (affecting...

After a long, anticipating wait, you have been selected to enter hygiene school. You did all the prerequisites, got good grades, and now you are here! In two or three years, depending on your program, you will enter the respectable and rewarding dental profession. Two years do not sound like much, but trust me, the days are packed in a...

Geographic tongue is an inflammatory, but harmless, condition affecting the surface of the tongue. With geographic tongue, patches on the surface of the tongue are missing papillae and appear as smooth, red "islands," often with slightly raised borders. Geographic tongue is said to be idiopathic in nature. With so much research connecting systemic disease with oral manifestations, is it...

Currently, more people are flossing than ever! However, don’t get excited… They are flossing their bodies not their teeth (you know you have tried it!) If I could get my son to be as diligent with his math as he is with his floss dance, he would become the next Albert Einstein. Flossing, such a simple concept yet practiced...

One of the most challenging tasks dental hygienists face is taking the patient’s clinical diagnosis and trying to make it fit into an insurance code to successfully gain payment. Too often, the front office states that a code won’t prompt payment or that the insurance won’t cover a procedure. One philosophy that we can follow is to treat patients based...

March 2020 has forever changed our world as well as the way we treat patients in the dental setting. Adhering to strict Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines to ensure the safety and health of our patients, ourselves, and co-workers have been the standard of care since AIDS surfaced in the 1980s. The onset of COVID-19 has required...

Why is pain so variable with dental patients? How do some patients tolerate non-surgical periodontal therapy along root surfaces with zero anesthetic? They take it like a champ ─ no flinching, no facial gestures, no moaning, no fidgeting, and no “ouch.” After the dental appointment ends, they reflect, “It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.” However, other...