Texas Dentists for Change Blog

The TDA House of Delegates meets this week to consider the recommendations of the Workforce Committee.  It will be recommended that the TDA change its position on several issues, including hygeinist administration of local anesthetic.  Please contact your delegate and tell them to vote YES!

If you are attending the Texas Meeting, then do all you can to talk it up.  The grassroots work has been done, now we need to take it to completion with the TDA.

See you in San Antonio.

TDA members are recieving the workforce survey now.  Please do not delay, fill it out as soon as you see it.  The survey is short and fairly straightforward, which is a good sign to all Texas dentists who desire expanded duty changes.

To all dentists with professional contacts, referral contacts, neighbors in office complexes, etc….PLEASE remind and influence as many as you can to participate in the survey.  At this point, this appears to be the most likely way to get some changes in Texas. 

Thanks

Dr. Marcus Whitmore

admin@texasdentistsforchange.com

I have been campaigning for expanded dental hygiene duties and expanded assistant duties for an awfully long time, Marc.
 
I started practicing in 1972 and the State Dental Practice act has certainly been an  artificial and silly influence on practices for as long as I remember. At one time, the dental assistants were only allowed to do things that were specifically written into the law, so, for instance, since the curing lights for composites were new, that ability wasn’t written into the law, and so it was illegal to have an assistant hold the curing light to cure composites! Thankfully, that one was changed, but it typifies the backward thinking we have had to put up with from our TDA. And all dental legislation has to pass by the TDA, from what the legislators tell me, so don’t believe someone if they tell you that the TDA isn’t the main arbiter there.
 
The issue of hygiene anesthesia has been a long festering part of a big struggle, which seems to have been a conflict with the TDA and the TDHA. And even though the leadership of the TDHA turns over every year, and none of their leaders can spend time in Austin and hire lobbyists, the TDA always acts like this uppity-ness of our “girls” is going to be the ruin of all of us. Even when they talk to dentists in New Mexico, or Oklahoma or Washington or South Carolina, these dental politicians want us to think that somehow Texas is different, and the hygienists will want independent practices and all sorts of fearful consequences will follow.
 
So, seemingly without fail, when I have spoken to any TDA leader, the response has been couched in terms of that old conflict, instead of giving any thought to what might be good for Texas dental teams and the patients they serve. In states that have expanded hygiene functions, the dentists do better economically, the patients get more expansive and thorough treatment and a higher level of care, and I am still trying to figure out the threat in that. Instead of leadership, our TDA is simply dragging its feet, because of the stubbornness of some of the leaders. They realize there is no moral or economic reason to oppose hygiene anesthesia.
 
If there was a problem with this concept, don’t you think that one of the 41 states where it is legal would have figured it out by now? Why should we put up with leaders who have survived twenty years in smoke filled rooms, who care more about their back slapping buddies than the dentists they represent, and the patients they are serving. It is time to get this concept moving, and I fear that right now, our leadership is more worried about looking bad by “caving in” to the demand for expanded duties, than to swallow hard and decide to do the right thing.
 
When you talk with a TDA representative, invariably he will tell you that personally, he has nothing against hygiene anesthesia, but that some of the older and more conservative dentists are dead set against it. Well, there aren’t too many dentists around still practicing who are that much older than me, and I am saying it is time for a change and time to move forward toward a better future, even though I might not be practicing when this law takes full effect. It is time for leaders to exhibit some qualities of leadership!
 
Rick Coker
UTDB, class of ‘72
Tyler, TX

 

There are many related issues pertaining to the legislative efforts of dentists in this session.  Please register and post!

Periodontists, we need your input and support on this issue for sure!  Please register and post!

Posts related to the activities of the Texas Dental Association, as they oppose progress on the issue of allowing hygienists to administer local anesthetic.

Pediatric Dentists let your concerns be heard!  Please register and post!

Hygienists…let your voice be heard…please register and post!