What is continuing dental education?
When you graduate from dental school and become a practicing dentist, state licensure boards require that you complete varying amounts of continuing dental education, usually beginning in your second year of practice.
Continuing education requirements ensure that practicing members of the profession stay up to date on the latest advancements and developments in the industry and are thus able to provide the safest and most comprehensive array of treatments.
Some of the hundreds of classes available include the following:
- Handling medical emergencies in the dental setting
- Avoiding embezzlement, and protecting your office and assets
- Infection control and dental waste management
- Single tooth and full-bridge dental implants
- Men’s health issues
- Avoiding employment lawsuits
Benefits of continued dental education
While ensuring patient safety and upholding one’s own education and ability as a dentist is reason enough to get your requirements in, continuing dental education also provides benefits that include a very tangible and direct return of investment.
You can graduate from dental school with enough training and experience to provide many services as a dentist. Then, throughout your career, you expand your professional repertoire and become able to offer a much wider range of services.
State licensing board requirements
A brief look at what is required by the Dental Board of California is a great example since the state is home to the most dentists in the United States. Board requirements do vary from state to state, nevertheless, this is a great starting point:
- A licensed dentist needs to accumulate at least 50 units CE Units, according to Title 16, California Code of Regulations, Sections 1016 and 1017.
- Individual courses to be taken do not require approval, as long as the course’s provider is approved.
- CE course providers must be approved by either the American Dental Association’s Continuing Education Recognition Program (CERP) or the Academy of General Dentistry’s Program Approval for Continuing Education (PACE).
- There are certain mandatory courses to be taken including those of Basic Life Support, Infection Control, and the state’s Dental Practice Act.
- No more than half of the required 50 units may come from non-live or correspondence courses.
- Only first-time licensees renewing their licenses for the first time are exempt from CE requirements.
Implant courses: Needed by patients. Rewarding and remunerative for dentists.
One of the most needed and most remunerative classes of continuing education that dentists may take is classes on dental implants. The dental implant industry is booming. It was valued at $5.6 billion in 2017 and is forecast to grow to $8 billion over the next seven years.
Yet despite the growing need of patients, according to the latest metrics, only 10 percent of dentists in the United States can place dental implants.
Dental implant courses by Implant Success Today
Implant Success Today provides dentists with extensive dental implant training in two different settings.
- The Core Continuum is conducted in IST’s own state-of-the-art training facility in La Crosse, Wisconsin. This first series of three classes are taught by an expert faculty in a very engaging and lively environment. You’ll learn the core concepts of dental implants, everything you need to know about patient selection, and what tools are required, and how they are used. You will see live dental implant surgeries in action, and have the opportunity to familiarize yourself with placing dental implants in models that give you a feel for the procedure.
- The Core Continuum is followed by Live Implant Training in San Pedro, Dominican Republic. During this five-day training program, you’ll round out your training to arrive at a place of total familiarity with implants in your practice, and a mastery of the surgical tools and techniques required. Dentists at this program will actually place somewhere between 17 and 20 implants over the five-day period.
CE credits from Implant Success Today
Live Implant Training consists of six hours of lecture and 32 hours of total participation. Completion of the course yields 38 CE credits.
Each of the three courses in the Core Continuum consists of 12 hours of lecture and 2 hours of hands-on learning and practice. Completion of each course yields 14 CE credits.
Beyond credits: The IST Philosophy
While CE credits are a legally required part of practicing dentistry, we are Implant Success Today like to look beyond the credits and focus on what we feel is truly important.
We want you to complete the Core Continuum and Live Implant Training having achieved a very practical set of tools that will truly help you grow your practice, and to very professionally provide a much-needed service to your patients. As mentioned, according to the most recent statistics, just 10 percent of dentists currently place dental implants, yet the need for implants is increasing exponentially.
We’re so committed to our students and confident in our results, that after your graduation, we’ll continue to help you overcome any barriers and obstacles that get in the way of your ability to successfully provide dental implants at your practice.