If you want to quickly get a job in healthcare that comes with a decent salary, you should consider becoming a dental assistant. You can also use this position to advance to other, better-compensated jobs within healthcare.
What Does a Dental Assistant Do?
A dental assistant helps the staff in a dentist’s office perform clinical and administrative tasks. These tasks include appointment scheduling, ordering supplies, keeping records, as well as more clinical tasks such as using suction tools, making dental impressions, and doing x-rays.
Benefits of Being a Dental Assistant
Working as a dental assistant has many benefits. Here are some of the biggest ones:
Excellent job security: The U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics (BSL) [1] reports that this field is expected to grow by almost 39,000 jobs or 11% between 2018 and 2026.
Training is quick: It takes less than 12 months to complete a fully accredited training program for dental assistants.
Salaries are competitive: With such a short training period required, dental assistants enjoy very competitive salaries.
Numerous career options are available: Most people who become dental assistants will later go on to more advanced roles that take many different directions such as becoming a dentist or switching to dental hygiene.
How to Become a Dental Assistant
There are a few basic steps that you need to complete in order to start working as a dental assistant:
Finish a program for dental assistants: There is no shortage of programs for dental assistants, as most technical schools and community colleges offer training. In fact, the Commission on Dental Accreditation lists about 270 programs. [2] Certificate programs last between 9 and 12 months. An associate degree program often takes up to two years and these are the best options for people that want to progress further with their career.
Finish an externship: The majority of training programs for dental assistants suggest that you look for an externship to gain valuable dental assisting experience such as chairside assistance and dental pathology.
Complete certification if necessary in your state: States that require dental assistant certification work with the Dental Assistant National Board (DANB) and give out a Certified Dental Assistant (CDA) certification.
Seek other certifications: Other certifications may be useful if you want to move up to better positions later on. For example, you can become a Certified Restorative Functions Dental Assistant (CRFDA) or a Certified Orthodontic Dental Assistant (CODA).
How Much Do Dental Assistants Earn?
The BLS [3] reports that the median hourly wage for dental assistants is $18.59 or $38,660 per year. Of course, you can earn much more than this, but also expect to earn a bit less as you start out.
Conclusion
With training programs lasting under a year and tuitions being relatively inexpensive, it’s easy to see why becoming a dental assistant is so popular. Moreover, there’s room for advancement, but you also get a good starting salary. You can also pick between almost 300 accredited programs spread across the entire country, with many online courses which offers incredible flexibility.
Still, you should do research and compare at least a few different options before making your final decision. Searching online for dental assistant programs is the fastest and easiest way to get all the information you need.
[1] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/dental-assistants.htm
[3] https://www.bls.gov/ooh/healthcare/dental-assistants.htm