General Information

Dental assistants are significant and valuable members of the dental health care team. They perform a wide variety of duties which include preparing the patients and work area for treatment and procedures, assisting dentists chairside as they examine and treat patients, taking dental radiographs, and ensuring proper infection control which includes the sterilization of instruments. Dental assistants may also perform office duties like scheduling and confirming patients, filing patient's treatment records, billing, and ordering dental supplies. Dental assistants greatly increase a dentist's ability to efficiently deliver quality care and assist in making patients as comfortable as possible.

Upon completion of the two-semester program, the successful student will have been trained to perform chairside assisting, take impressions and make dental models, mix cements, make provisional crowns, take radiographs, perform select front office duties, and work with a variety of dental materials. Graduates of the program are neither guaranteed licensure nor eligibility to take any licensure exam following program completion.