maxill's Dental Blog

As a consumer standing in front of a well orchestrated display of oral care products, one word comes to mind; overwhelming! Added into the already overwhelming list of products is an entire line up of natural oral health care products. Marketing is aimed to have every product promise to deliver something wonderful. That may be the case, however, is that ‘something’ wonderful suited for your clients' needs? Is what your client is putting in their mouth good for them? Even if they are natural products?

There is a current and robust trend to embrace all-natural products from what we eat, what we put in and, on our bodies, and lately, what we use for oral hygiene home care. We, as consumers, assume that natural products are better for our health and the environment. The vast array of dental products on store shelves along with internet and television advertisements flood our patients with the latest and greatest products....

Dental professionals spend numerous hours a day dental practices reprocessing dental instruments. We open the box of sterilization pouches, fill them with instruments and send them to the heat and pressure of our autoclaves. How much thought do we put into that little plastic and paper bag?

Dental professionals know that patients that use tobacco products of any kind have a higher risk of oral health issues such as oral and throat cancers, chronic gum disease, tooth decay, tooth abrasion, stains, bad breath, dry mouth, impaired taste and smell, and mouth sores that do not heal.

Before being an RDH, I was a CDA and then a CPDA for 4 years. I oversaw ordering burs, sterilizing burs, and storing them in bur blocks in an official bur drawer. These were the years where a loose unpackaged sterile burs in a bur block was acceptable in infection prevention and control.

I remember my trips to the dentist as a child and looking at the dental bur blocks on the counter. I remember thinking there were so many and hoping they did not have to use the giant ones on me. At the time, of course, I did not realize that there were so many types of burs.

The pre-pandemic patients are getting scheduled, the office is ready with updated infection control policies, the dentist is anxious to return to business as usual. However, the roadblock to retaining or recruiting new dental team members remains exceptionally challenging. Dental offices are still struggling with a labor shortage of hygienists, assistants, and administrative staff. So, what is a dental office to do? What are some solutions to the current dental labor shortage roadblock?

Is poor job satisfaction the reason for the current dental labor shortage? Have dental professionals reached their breaking point with burnout, job dissatisfaction, and their work-life harmony out of balance? Or is the stress of the current COVID-19 pandemic causing the labor shortage in dentistry? What is causing dental professionals to leave the job they had always loved?