What Is a Dental Hygienist and How Much Do They Make?

Being an oral hygiene professional can be an exceptionally rewarding and exciting career. With salaries approaching $90,000 a year in various states, it's easy to see why it's an ever-expanding profession. However, before you embark on your quest to become a licensed dental hygienist, you'll need to understand the daily duties of a dental hygienist as well as the essential knowledge needed to thrive in this type of work. Check out here more about this article.

A dental hygienist professional performs a couple of general tasks within the dental practice, namely:

- Educate patients on acceptable dental hygiene

- Support the certified dentist as part of the diagnosis and daily treatment of affected people.

The oral hygiene professional as a teacher

One of the required duties of a professional dental hygienist is to continually counsel patients on the life-enhancing benefits of ideal dental hygiene while always maintaining a proper lifestyle. This consists of introducing clients to the proper way to brush their teeth, proper flossing practices, correct toothbrush use, as well as advising patients on the relationship of their diet regimen to their dental hygiene. . Educating patients is an essential area of ​​employment that helps prevent significant oral cavities and also improves the health and well-being of clients.

Daily Responsibilities of the Dental Hygienist

An additional element of the licensed dental hygienist's job is to be active in offering assistance to the oral health care provider. Below on the page is a sample of common tasks performed by a licensed dental hygiene professional:

• Organization of examinations for the dental professional.
• Assess and optimize an individual's oral health
• Clean clients' teeth to remove yellowing, cavity-causing plaque, or tartar
• Polishing tooth enamel
• Use of local anesthesia services (if allowed where you live, may require additional certificates)
• Application and reading of oral radiographs
• Put on fluorides, varnishes, as well as hole and fissure sealants to repair dental caries.

In addition to that, you will specifically work with a dental professional to recognize complications and collaborate to cure patients of their oral diseases. Most of the time, it is the examination of the gums and teeth by the dental hygienist that identifies disease or problems and then reports it to the dentist for review. In these types of circumstances, the dentist and dental hygienist come together to create a solution for the patient.