Recent Strategies for Recruitment and Retention of Oral Health Workers

Spring 2025 Findings 

Respondents from dental offices and clinics shared information with the Washington Health Workforce Sentinel Network about the recruitment and retention strategies they were using in the Spring of 2025. 

How effective have these strategies been in achieving your recruitment and retention goals? 

• “Very effective but obviously cuts into profitability. We are competing with each other in this market so if you don’t offer more [in wages] the practice down the street will.” 

• “Good at retention of existing, still not effective in obtaining new employees.” 

• “It has worked for retention but not for the long-term viability of the business.” 

• “More ergonomic tools and equipment.  Have to do accelerated hygiene due to lack of hygienist. New software to help front desks.” 

• “They have been effective, but you can’t keep raising salaries to keep people.  There is a cost of doing business and the reimbursement rate is stagnant.” 

In the past year, what resources have you used to recruit new employees? 

How effective have these resources been in helping you recruit new employees? 

• “Very effective. Our employee referral program nets a large number of referring employees. Our dental residency program has resulted in 25% of graduates that are taking positions with us. “ 

• “I think the message boards, word of mouth, and in-house training for advancement has been helpful with recruiting for our dental assistants and administrative/office staff. I think job fairs were not super helpful, but got the word out to high school aged students about more entry level positions and alternatives to going to college with our on-the-job training programs. I think connection with post-secondary education has been helpful in recruiting higher level staff, like Dentists and Dental Hygienists.” 

• “Better than if we did nothing.” 

• “Each have been successful in finding someone to hire.  Pickings are slim, but at least I get at least one decent candidate.” 

• “We get applicants from these, however, without experience so OTJ training is required.” 

Spring 2024 Findings

Respondents from dental offices and clinics shared information with the Washington Health Workforce Sentinel Network about the recruitment and retention strategies they were using in the Spring of 2024.

Describe any new retention strategies your dental office or clinic has implemented in the past year and their impact on staff retention.

• We strive to have a great culture in our workplace and have for several years now. It’s often quoted by team members as to why they stay with our practice so long. Our wages [are] competitive – we are not paying top dollar for skilled team members.
• Improved training for success, career pathway building upon growing careers.
• I have been making presentations to the high schools in the local counties on dental workforce opportunities and career laddering opportunities within the dental field. I speak to the senior classes.
• Are still in progress and include compensation adjustments and work life balance adjustments.
• Continuing education and trainings, increased wages.

Spring 2025 Findings 

Currently, what are your organization’s top workforce issues?  

Two-thirds of respondents representing dental offices and clinics said recruiting new workers/filling vacancies and a third of respondents said retaining current workers/increasing worker satisfaction. Respondents from both rural and urban settings reported difficulties recruiting new workers and filling vacancies. 

• “We have been advertising for a dental hygienist for over a year. We have not received any applications and when we try to recruit from the dental hygiene school an hour away DSOs are sweeping in or they are not willing to move to our area.” 

• “I own a private dental practice.  All professional industries are finding it difficult to get professionals to move to [our area].  The local community health dental clinics and DSO offices offer their associate dentists more by way of salary and benefits than a private practice dental office can afford.” 

• “Finding and retaining a hygienist is difficult or impossible.  I have listed on Indeed, Facebook groups, hygiene schools, have tried word of mouth through my current employees, and no good candidate has been found for a few months.  The ones that reply are either not skilled, have a personality conflict, or want way too much money.  It is negatively impacting patient care.” 

• “We are contracted with many dental insurance companies, and our fees have remained the same or shrunk over the last 15 years.  It is hard to increase pay without being able to increase the fee for the work you are doing.  We have to be more efficient with our time, and have also tried to push for changes with the dental insurance landscape.” 

• “Hourly rates of dental assistants and dental hygienists have gone up so much, but insurance reimbursement has not.” 

In the past year, has your organization supported “grow-your-own” programs (i.e., apprenticeships, residencies or on-the-job training opportunities) to train workers for specific roles? 

Roughly half of respondents supported “grow-your-own” programs, with a higher proportion of rural respondents supporting these programs.  

• “Both front office and dental assistant positions can be trained with no prior experience in a dental office.” 

• “We have trained or attempted to train several dental assistants.” 

• “We attempted to collaborate with a staff member and a local university to develop a dental assistant.  The effort was unsuccessful because the staff member was not able to undertake a structured education process.” 

• “Dental assistants are being trained as sterile tech then graduate into chairside assisting.” 

• “We take interns from the local Tech school for dental assistants.” 

Some who have not yet supported “grow-your-own” programs, would consider exploring these kinds of programs. 

• “The only way for an assistant to become a hygienist is to go back to school and leave the workforce.  The only way a hygienist can become a dentist is to go back to school and leave the workforce.  However, an apprenticeship model for this would likely result in poorly trained dentists and hygienists.” 

• “Yes, but we cannot put patients at risk and pay to train people, it’s not financially possible and a risk.” 

To what extent have the following affected your ability to recruit and retain your workforce in the past year? 

• Childcare and housing remain top issues for employers across urban and rural geographies, impacting their recruitment and retention efforts. 

Frequency Respondents Indicate Factors Affect Recruitment/Retention in Dental Offices/Clinics 

Childcare availability 

• “Affordable childcare for employees continues to be an issue.  We should have childcare incentives for employees who work in health care.” 

• “Childcare hours and cost are a barrier for many full time employees.” 

• “Child care is so expensive.  Some assistants don’t make enough to justify the large child care expense and the elect to stay at home.” 

Housing availability 

• “This goes along with transportation- there are minimal affordable options, so then people live further away, making the commute longer.” 

• “Lack of quality housing in the city or in the county.” 

• “High housing costs require some to travel much further for affordable housing.” 

Transportation options were an occasional concern for mostly urban dental offices/clinics. 

• “Limited bus routes to the office in the event someone doesn’t have a car.” 

• “Staff have been inconsistent in attendance when their primary vehicle is unreliable.” 

Violence or aggression in the workplace did not appear to be a concern for dental offices/clinics, generally.  

• “We serve a complex community and promote trauma informed care. We provide training for all employees in this area.” 

Spring 2024

In Spring 2024,  80% of Health Workforce Sentinel Network respondents from dental offices and clinics reported that staffing issues are worse than or about the same as they were six months ago.

In the past six months, how has your dental office or clinic’s ability to staff your facility/facilities changed?

Comment examples

• [Is much worse] There just are not the trained staff available.
• [Is slightly worse] Fewer applicants.
• [Has stayed the same] In the past 6 months the hiring situation seems to have stabilized. Our main problem now is that team member wages have drastically increased while patient revenue has remained stagnant. It’s resulted in a significant decrease in profit margin for the business and we are faced with possibly reducing the team size in effort to control overhead.
• [Is slightly better] New experienced dental office/clinic manager.

How would you describe your dental office or clinic’s use of contract/travel workers now compared with your use a year ago?

Has your dental office or clinic adopted, or is it considering adopting, forms of artificial intelligence (AI) to help improve administrative workflows? 

One third (33%) of respondents indicated they adopted AI to help improve administrative workflows. Below are example responses:

• AI software submitting insurance claims and posting insurance payments via machine readable EOBs. AI software is also being used to screen dental x-rays to help detect pathology. AI software is being used to design night guards.
• We have not developed any AI platforms, and don’t know if there are any specific software, systems or SOPs for the dental clinic. But we’d like to develop a Tele-Dentistry platform to be used for all the medical clinics and (2) hospitals for emergent dental care during clinic, after hours and weekends.

Responses from Dental Offices, Dental Clinics, and Community Health Centers

Twice a year, oral health providers in Washington share information about their workforce needs with Washington’s Health Workforce Sentinel Network. Educators and policy makers can use this information to understand challenges related to recruitment, retention, and the employee skills that are in highest demand.

The dashboard below shows responses from Sentinel Network respondents at dental offices, dentals clinics, and community health centers (CHCs, including federally qualified health centers – FQHCs).