Latest / Talking FACS / Dental Career Opportunities

Transcript

Dental Career Opportunities · Talking FACS

• 0:01
  Welcome to Talking Facts and thank you for tuning in to Kentucky Smiles on Talking Facts,
• 0:06
  a podcast collaboration between the University of Kentucky College of Dentistry and the UK College of Agriculture,
• 0:13
  Food and Environment Cooperative Extension Service.
• 0:16
  Kentucky Smiles offers listeners information on maintaining oral health advancements in dental treatments,
• 0:22
  research and more.
• 0:26
  Hello and welcome to Kentucky Smiles on Talking Facts.
• 0:29
  This is your host,
• 0:29
  Doctor Jennifer Hunter,
• 0:30
  Assistant Director for Family Consumer Sciences Extension at the University of Kentucky.
• 0:35
  Today,
• 0:36
  I'm pleased to be joined by Doctor Nuss Backer,
• 0:39
  the Associate Dean of Clinical Affairs in the UK College of Dentistry.
• 0:44
  Welcome.
• 0:45
  Thank you.
• 0:45
  Thank you very much doctor.
• 0:47
  So today we are going to talk about careers in dentistry and I think so often that you,
• 0:54
  you know,
• 0:54
  we all go to the dentist or at least we should all go to the dentist every once in a while for a checkup.
• 1:00
  And so we think about or at least I do.
• 1:03
  I think about the dentist that I see every six months.
• 1:05
  Hopefully not much more often than that,
• 1:08
  but the dentist I see every six months.
• 1:10
  But really and truly,
• 1:11
  there's,
• 1:12
  there's so many more opportunities within the field of dentistry beyond maybe just that one career,
• 1:18
  that one position that we think about that we think about.
• 1:21
  And so today we're gonna discuss that some,
• 1:22
  um,
• 1:23
  what are some of those career opportunities in dentistry?
• 1:27
  Yeah.
• 1:27
  So,
• 1:27
  besides the,
• 1:29
  what you're talking about the,
• 1:30
  the dentist themselves,
• 1:31
  there are lots of different options in,
• 1:33
  in dentistry offices and clinics need dental assistance to help,
• 1:36
  help the,
• 1:37
  as part of the team,
• 1:38
  there are dental hygienists who are often do the cleanings and the x-rays and so forth.
• 1:43
  There are laboratory technicians who help use things such as retainers after after orthodontics and different appliances,
• 1:51
  numerous other areas uh including uh people that work from a clerical standpoint in the office,
• 1:57
  you know,
• 1:57
  running the front desk and running the financial parts of things.
• 2:00
  So there are all these different aspects of the dental team besides just the dentist himself.
• 2:05
  So obviously some of those careers and positions are very specialized.
• 2:10
  Can you talk a little bit about some of the specific schooling requirements?
• 2:15
  Yeah,
• 2:15
  it does vary from state to state a little bit on what the requirements are.
• 2:19
  But for the dentists themselves,
• 2:21
  uh usually there are several years of college that's followed by dental school.
• 2:25
  Like,
• 2:25
  uh for example,
• 2:26
  here at the University of Kentucky,
• 2:27
  we have a four year program for dental school.
• 2:30
  If you go into some of the specialties such as orthodontics,
• 2:33
  which is people that do braces or you go into oral surgery that do things like extractions and other surgeries.
• 2:39
  That's additional years after dental school for some of the other positions,
• 2:43
  example would be a dental assistant.
• 2:45
  There are dental assistant training programs around so that you can learn,
• 2:49
  learn the skills and knowledge that you need to step in as a dental assistant and the dental assistants,
• 2:54
  it will vary a lot depending on what area that you're in and what the training looks like.
• 2:58
  You know,
• 2:58
  we do have a training program here at the University of Kentucky for dental assistance.
• 3:03
  That is a six month training,
• 3:04
  uh that gives all the basic information so that people can step in into the clinical aspect set chairside with the dentist working with patients.
• 3:13
  So I did not realize that we had that here at at UK.
• 3:16
  Does that partner with a degree program or is that a specialized program that an individual signs up for?
• 3:24
  It's basically a specialized certificate program that people apply to specifically in that area.
• 3:30
  However,
• 3:30
  it's tied directly in with the College of Dentistry.
• 3:33
  So the experience that people get here is that they work with our faculty dentists as well as our dental students in seeing patients over that six month span.
• 3:42
  Once they get the basic information and,
• 3:45
  and learn sort of the instruments and the terminology and so forth,
• 3:48
  that's,
• 3:49
  that's required.
• 3:51
  What might someone or why might someone consider a career in the dental field.
• 3:57
  You know,
• 3:57
  it's an interesting dental field.
• 3:58
  It's very popular for a very,
• 4:00
  for various reasons.
• 4:01
  Um,
• 4:02
  one of the things that people sort of like is that it is in the area of medicine,
• 4:06
  a lot of people that go into health care in general,
• 4:09
  like the idea of helping people and in dentistry it's no different.
• 4:12
  We're helping people,
• 4:13
  um,
• 4:13
  helping achieve a smile that they're interested in helping,
• 4:17
  uh,
• 4:17
  when there's a pain issue to deal with or just helping general health to stay and maintain it at the level that,
• 4:23
  that they would like.
• 4:24
  Some of the,
• 4:25
  the things about the profession is the work life balance is very nice.
• 4:29
  You know,
• 4:29
  most offices are open during the day.
• 4:31
  There's not a lot in most cases that are done beyond the kind of quote unquote normal,
• 4:36
  hourly,
• 4:37
  daily working hours.
• 4:38
  It,
• 4:39
  it allows a lot of flexibility for people that have families uh both in the,
• 4:43
  if you're the dentist,
• 4:44
  if you're the hygienist,
• 4:45
  if you're assistant gives a lot of flexibility for,
• 4:48
  for anyone in those in those areas.
• 4:50
  And uh that's something that people really,
• 4:52
  really enjoy about it.
• 4:53
  It's also so it continues to grow.
• 4:55
  I mean,
• 4:55
  dental care,
• 4:56
  it's understood,
• 4:57
  it's,
• 4:57
  it's very important for people as far as general health.
• 5:01
  And I think people are starting to understand how important that is.
• 5:03
  So there's always a need,
• 5:04
  there's been a tremendous need recently.
• 5:06
  In fact,
• 5:06
  for,
• 5:07
  for people in all these areas.
• 5:08
  If an individual is interested in transitioning into a career within the dental field,
• 5:15
  yet,
• 5:15
  you talked a little bit about the dental assistant program.
• 5:18
  But are there other programs to help someone transition?
• 5:22
  Yeah.
• 5:22
  So what's interesting about that is we get people that come into our D MD program,
• 5:27
  which is our training for the dentists,
• 5:29
  uh,
• 5:29
  as well as our assisting programs from every walk of life,
• 5:32
  every,
• 5:32
  every conceivable background,
• 5:34
  the requirements of course,
• 5:35
  are different for those things.
• 5:37
  But we have people that had previously had different careers that just wanted to shift gears.
• 5:42
  Maybe they've moved and so their,
• 5:44
  their wife style changes.
• 5:45
  Those of us that have Children,
• 5:46
  we know they get older and they often often move out of the house.
• 5:49
  And at that point,
• 5:50
  maybe they have a little more time and they'd like to explore another career for themselves.
• 5:54
  So there are all these different um uh directions and options to go into more so than ever.
• 6:00
  We get a lot of also non-traditional students who,
• 6:02
  who join,
• 6:03
  whether it be our D MD program,
• 6:05
  our dental assisting or um some of the hygiene programs that are,
• 6:08
  that are around.
• 6:09
  So that's interesting.
• 6:10
  I was just getting ready to ask about nontraditional students.
• 6:13
  So you,
• 6:13
  you mentioned the programs that are held here within the UK College of Dentistry.
• 6:17
  But for a dental hygiene program or a dental assistant program,
• 6:21
  is that for someone that may not be in Fayette County or the surrounding area are those opportunities that are out in the state as well.
• 6:29
  Certainly the hygiene program,
• 6:31
  actually the way hygiene programs in the state of Kentucky are run.
• 6:35
  So we don't actually directly here at the university run hygiene.
• 6:38
  Those are through the community colleges around the state.
• 6:41
  So there's several hygiene programs around the state.
• 6:45
  A few of them in some of the more rural areas actually are combined with assisting programs.
• 6:50
  So there's an assistant slash hygiene program and a few of those.
• 6:54
  And then others,
• 6:54
  we've actually talked to some of the other community colleges about the possibility of starting dedicated dental assisting training as well.
• 7:02
  Does it matter what type of degree an individual has if they want to go to dental school or if they want to consider one of the hygienist assistant training programs?
• 7:13
  Yeah.
• 7:13
  So what's really interesting about that is traditionally,
• 7:16
  people always went into specific areas in a pre dental career.
• 7:20
  But these days we get people from,
• 7:22
  from every walk of life with every sort of background,
• 7:25
  the D MD degree generally does require a college degree to apply.
• 7:30
  But really the the more important thing is that there are certain requirements as far as specific courses.
• 7:35
  And so people would have to have the specific courses before they were to apply.
• 7:39
  Now,
• 7:40
  dental hygiene is a little bit less um stringent in those courses,
• 7:43
  although they do have some requirements and dental assisting also a little less stringent.
• 7:48
  So it's always good to kind of look into the specifics of the program you'd be looking at as far as what is required.
• 7:54
  But like I said,
• 7:55
  we get people from,
• 7:56
  I can't tell you every walk of life that gets involved either initially as a young,
• 8:01
  younger person coming through school or as a second career for,
• 8:05
  for a lot of nontraditional students.
• 8:07
  And is it safe to make the assumption that upon graduation from either dental school or the hygienist program or the assistant program that their jobs are plentiful,
• 8:17
  that it's easy to find placement right now.
• 8:20
  The the dental field,
• 8:21
  I mean,
• 8:22
  I'm biased because I've,
• 8:23
  I've lived in this field for a long time and I love it.
• 8:25
  It is remarkable how much demand there is for dental assistants,
• 8:30
  dental hygienists and in the state of Kentucky for dentists,
• 8:33
  we still are lacking in all those areas.
• 8:35
  So existing offices and clinics and even here at the university,
• 8:39
  we're constantly looking for people that want to come and join our team to,
• 8:43
  to work with us.
• 8:43
  So there's a huge demand for people all over the state.
• 8:47
  Frankly.
• 8:48
  Excellent,
• 8:49
  Doctor Nuss Baer.
• 8:50
  Thank you so much for joining us today and sharing about careers in dentistry and how someone might explore that you have provided us with uh several websites for someone that might be interested in learning more about the programs available at UK or why someone might want to pursue a career in the dental field.
• 9:09
  For our listeners.
• 9:10
  We will have those linked in the show notes to take a look at.
• 9:13
  Thank you very much and it's a wonderful career.
• 9:16
  I look forward to seeing people become engaged joining us and,
• 9:20
  and being part of what we do.
• 9:21
  Excellent.
• 9:22
  Thank you so much.
• 9:23
  Have a wonderful day.
• 9:24
  Thank you.
• 9:26
  Thank you for listening to Kentucky.
• 9:28
  Smiles on Talking facts.
• 9:30
  Our goal is to provide you with knowledge to support your oral health needs.
• 9:35
  If you have suggestions for future topics,
• 9:37
  please message us on the UK College of Dentistry.
• 9:40
  Facebook page at facebook dot com forward slash UK Y dentistry or visit our website at UK healthcare dot UK Y dot E D U forward slash dentistry.
• 9:51
  For more information.