Dental assistant: duties, job requirements, job descriptions

2024 Author: Howard Calhoun | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:16

In dentistry, the practice of four-handed work is the most popular and convenient format for interaction between a doctor and his assistant, therefore, in clinics engaged in this direction, recruitment agencies try to recruit experienced and reliable employees not only for the position of doctors, but also for vacancies for junior medical staff. What are the duties of a dental assistant, what does he do in the workplace, what rights does he have and what does his scope of responsibility cover - comprehensive information in the article.

What kind of profession is a dental assistant?

The dental assistant is the right hand of any dentist. Without him, not a single clinic will be able to function normally, since he performs all the preparatory work in the doctor's office, helps him at the reception, leadsdocumentation. The rest of the duties of a dental assistant are determined by his immediate superiors - the doctor and the head of the clinic (department). Usually, these specialists perform near-medical care without interfering with the treatment process, but sometimes doctors delegate part of their own powers, instructing an assistant to perform an initial examination of the patient or perform simple manipulations with him.

This profession is quite in demand in the labor market, because there are a lot of offices providing services for the treatment of teeth and oral cavity in our country. The duties of a dental assistant in a private clinic may differ from those performed by a specialist in a budgetary organization. Firstly, because in each institution the doctor works with materials familiar to him and according to a certain technology, and secondly, because private practice doctors, as a rule, have more modern equipment, they modernize patient management protocols and respond faster to innovations in their field of activity.

Dental Assistant Education

In order to work as a dental assistant, you must have a secondary specialized medical education. At the same time, it is important for some clinics that the candidate graduated from any medical college with a degree in Nursing, while others fundamentally need a diploma in Preventive Dentistry.

In addition to a diploma confirming a level of knowledge sufficient for work, an assistant must receive a state certificate in a timely mannerspecialist. Recall that, according to the law, employers and regulatory authorities are not en titled to demand this document from graduates of educational institutions if they graduated less than five years ago. A specialist certificate is not just another piece of paper, but a serious attestation document that guarantees that a candidate for a vacant position in a clinic will be able to perform the duties of a dental assistant. The certificate confirms that the medical worker has sufficient theoretical and practical skills.

4 hand work

In advertisements for a dental assistant, the authors, as a rule, often indicate that the candidate must have sufficient skills and qualifications in order to work with a doctor in four hands. What does this mean? The doctor has to do all dental manipulations quickly enough: many filling materials, as well as medicines, must be removed from the package as soon as possible and applied as directed. At the same time, it is important to observe the phased work, not to confuse anything. Sometimes the work requires highlighting the area of reconstruction of the dentition with a special lamp, which the doctor himself cannot do. Also, a doctor often needs a quick change of a working tool, nozzles on drills, mirrors, forceps. It is for the speed of performing all these tasks that an assistant dentist is required. The assistant's duties are to always be in the doctor's access zone, quickly respond to his requests and know the sequence of his main actions in order to be able to predict the "order"boss.

If the tandem has developed successfully, and the doctor and his assistant understand each other perfectly, then their labor productivity increases significantly. Therefore, in clinics, work in 4 hands is so welcome. The duties of a dental assistant do not require a person to show excessive initiative, on the contrary, it is important that the assistant maintain business and personal subordination with the doctor, be executive, attentive and responsible.

Near-medical activities of a dental assistant

The range of duties assigned to a dental assistant is highly dependent on the doctor himself, as well as the services he provides. So, for generalists who are engaged in surgical, therapeutic manipulations, prosthetics, orthodontics and orthopedics, the requirements for assistants are more stringent. The functional responsibilities of dental assistants also differ due to the fact that they can be involved in the treatment process to a different extent. Near-medical assistance consists in performing the following types of work:

• compliance with sanitary standards in the office, timely disinfection, weekly general cleaning (washing floors, walls, ceilings, windows, furniture and equipment);
• preparation for the work of instruments, their disinfection, sterilization;
• cleaning the doctor's workplace at the end of the working day, including disinfection of handpieces, turning off equipment;
• keeping records of medicines, consumables and dressings, issuing them to the doctor, tracking expiration dates, balances;
• leadingdocumentation, patient records, filling out various reporting forms, making entries in cleaning journals, equipment serviceability, instrument sterilization.

And, of course, the main duties of a dental assistant are to quickly follow the doctor's orders during work, meet patients at the reception and escort them to the chair.

Partial Physician Assistant

In many clinics, assistants are also responsible for performing diagnostic procedures, which means they must be able to work with a visiograph and X-ray machine, take sighting, intraoral and panoramic images with their help.

If the assistant has a sufficiently good theoretical and practical knowledge base, the doctor can trust him to perform more complex tasks. In addition to all of the above, the following duties will be assigned to his shoulders:

• initial examination of the patient;
• partial implementation of preventive, therapeutic and diagnostic manipulations;
• help in the selection of filling material;
• maintaining cleanliness in the patient's mouth while the doctor is working (removing saliva, blood, rinsing the mouth).

Filling out the patient record is also the responsibility of the dental assistant. What should he say there? The name of the patient, his address, date of birth and age, the amount of work that the doctor did, his prescriptions.

Jobdental assistant instructions

Each clinic develops its own job description for employees. According to this document, the nuances of the work of employees are determined: rights, responsibilities, duties and requirements. A dental assistant is a serious position, therefore, in relation to him, the instruction should include the following mandatory items:

1. General provisions (education, seniority, additional skills and abilities; clarification of the service hierarchy; legislative standards required in the work; the acting assistant is indicated in case of his absence).
2. Responsibilities - a list of tasks that the assistant will need to perform.
3. Employee rights.
4. The responsibility he has towards the clinic and the patients.

The job description must be signed by both the head of the clinic and the subordinate. The date of its creation is put on the document. In this case, one copy remains in the clinic, and the other is given to the hands of a dental assistant.

Work Schedule

The duties of a dental assistant can be roughly divided into two components. The first is precisely the workflow and its interaction with the doctor. In addition, the dental assistant must have time to put the office in order, order medicines, instruments, consumables on time, disinfect and sterilize the instrument. Fulfilling these duties cannot interfere with the assistance of a physician when required.

The assistant, as a rule, arrives at work earlier than the doctor and leaves later - in order to have time to prepare the workplace before seeing patients and always be in the wings of the doctor. Dentists usually work in shifts - before lunch or after. Assistants are also not in the clinic from dawn to dusk, their working hours depend on the doctor's schedule, but it is longer than that of the immediate supervisor.

Documentation

The second component of the duties of a dental assistant is the maintenance of reporting and current documentation. The assistant fills out patient cards (in paper or electronic form), keeps various registers:

• safety;
• drug accounting;
• cleaning;
• disinfection and sterilization;
• equipment he alth.

Entries in these documents must be made in a timely manner, patient cards are filled out immediately - at the reception.

Rights and Responsibilities of a Dental Assistant

The rights of a dental assistant are not limited solely by the provisions of the labor legislation of the country in which he works - official employment, compliance with the regime of work and rest, the presence of a social package, etc. They also relate to the purely professional employment of a specialist. The assistant must fully receive the information he needs to perform his duties, and he also has the right to demand the support of management to perform the functions assigned to him.

A dental assistant isfinancially responsible person. Moreover, the doctor's assistant is responsible not only for the equipment, instruments and medicines entrusted to him, but also for his own actions. If, due to his negligence, inattention or unprofessional actions, the he alth or life of the patient was harmed, he will be responsible for this before the court. In case of serious errors, the doctor's assistant can be fined, deprived of the right to work in his position, or imprisoned in a penal colony.

Salary

The work of a dental assistant is estimated quite well. The highest salaries in this industry, of course, are noted in Moscow. In large dental clinics, assistants are paid from 60-75 thousand rubles a month, while those who are employed in smaller offices have to be content with 25-30 thousand rubles. There are a lot of open vacancies on labor exchanges, so a dental assistant can find a good job quickly enough. In the regions, things are not so rosy - there are much fewer places, and salaries are much lower. The average bar is 20-25 thousand, while some clinic assistants are ready to pay no more than 15 thousand rubles a month.