Dental hygienists are in high demand.
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Virginia is in desperate need of dental hygienists. But as Denise Allen Membreno tells us it’s not as simple as getting more students interested in the curriculum.
Virginia ranks second to last among states in meeting the demand for hygienists at 66% adequacy according to federal Health Resources and Services Administration projections. This is a problem caused by several factors according to Virginia Dental Association CEO Ryan Dunn. One is the student to teacher ratio requirement, another is finding instructors.
There’s workforce challenges because quite frankly, the pay for a hygienist in a clinical setting or in a private practice is so high and so good that it’s hard for some of these universities and community colleges to compete to attract the hygienist to come train and teach for what could be half of the salary they would make in the private sector, said Dunn.
Dunn says the interest is there, but schools cannot accommodate more students. Expanding these programs is difficult because they are costly to run. Money is coming from the new state budget though.
Twenty million was set aside for what they call high cost degrees and so that won’t all go to hygiene that will go to other the community college system deems as expensive programs to run like a hygiene because of the clinical side of things, Dunn explained.
Currently only roughly 135 students graduate each year from all dental hygiene programs in the state. Dunn says we need to bring that number up to 1000 to meet the need. Denise Allen Membreno WFIR News.
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There is no shortage of interest in dental hygiene programs in Virginia, what there is, is a shortage of is dental hygienists. WFIR’s Denise Allen Membreno explains.
Dental Hygiene programs are expensive. Virginia Dental Association CEO Ryan Dunn says the requirement of a low student to instructor ratio and the high expense of the clinical side of instruction make it difficult for community colleges and private schools to expand their programs. Virginia’s new budget has 20 million dollars to support high-cost degrees which include dental hygiene. The budget also includes $1 million to establish a dedicated fund to support the expansion of dental hygiene education programs in Virginia.
Just recently as community colleges have had to look at budgets and other constraints, they’ve had to, in a couple locations, had to freeze their programs on dental hygiene, said Dunn. So the $1 million, quite frankly, is going to just keep the doors open.
Dunn says instructors are hard to find because experienced hygienists make more money than schools can afford to pay. Many hygienists retired during or right after the Covid-19 pandemic which also exacerbated the problem.
There are on average about 135 that complete the programs and graduate across all the community colleges and private and public universities in Virginia, added Dunn. When we’re short 1000, you can see why we’re never really going to make up that gap without some major investment.
Hygienists are preventative specialists. A dentist is permitted to supervise up to four hygienists. Dunn says the availability of hygienists is the key factor in the practice’s ability to care for more patients. Denise Allen Membreno WFIR News.
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