Dental Technician
Dental Technician Career Guide
Dental Technician Career Guide
Jul 24th
How many of you have actually given a thought about how much dental technician could be earning. In the USA the salary band width will vary from state to state but if one were to take a national average, there are several categories under which payment is calculated for dental technicians.
The national average for employees of certified Dental Technician or CDT will vary by the job title that he or she holds.
The variation occurs in this manner:
Here is the most astounding pay package for a senior dental technician who will supervise a dental prosthetics facility. Monitoring the whole process, maintaining the standards prescribed by the Associations for such facilities and mentoring the junior technicians are some of the basic job details of a dental technician supervisor. The salary bandwidth will vary from a starting salary of about fifty thousand dollars to about seventy five dollars annually.
Considering the above national indices for the various dental technician posts, one is really amazed at the scope available for mere technicians.
Certified dental technicians are definitely better paid over the uncertified dental technician for whom it is an acquired skilled and not a tested skill. The significant differences in the pay scales should actually work as an incentive for experienced and skilled dental technician to voluntarily earn the certification and see the quantum jump in salary.
There is a school of thought that believes a mere certificate is insufficient to gauge the sheer talent and skill of an individual. What needs to be considered here is that, here is a technician who works in a very sensitive field of oral health of a individual and the government demanding a uniform gauging factor like a certification is definitely not discriminatory.
The increased salary package for the certified dental technician is purely an incentive or recognition of the extra effort and hard work the individual has put in to earn the additional knowledge as well as gain the experience in performing such skilled technical work.
Jul 11th
Dental prosthetics is a technical skill that is acquired by years of theoretical study and years of practice. A technician who masters these skills is called as a dental technician or a dental laboratory technician.
They are skilled craftsmen much like the goldsmiths and the ironsmiths of yore, who will work on our dental defects and build the prosthetic solution that the dentist has recommended. The tools of these modern day smiths or the dental technicians are crowns, bridges and his tools are orthodontic appliances.
So let us explore this exciting new world of dental technician and analyze the inside story.
Educational requirements for a dental technician
The trend till about the previous decade for dental technician was that most of them received training while on the job and did not pursue any particular course to gain the knowledge or the experience. But there have been significant changes in the past few years and technicians with formal training are being preferred over the non-qualified technicians.
In the USA, more than thirty dental laboratory courses or programs are conducted under the aegis of the American Dental Association, the umbrella organization for all things related to dentistry.
Certification for dental technicians is offered by the National Association of Dental Laboratories.
Are there specialization opportunities?
The hallmarks of a good dental technician is that he should be have manual dexterity, keen observation skills to recognize color variations good grasp of the shapes almost on the lines of a artist. If these skills are inherent in the technician then he could apply for greater specializations and could eventual manage a dental laboratory facility independently.
What is the scope of dental technicians?
The United States Statistical Society predicts that by 2016 there will be optimal demand for skilled certified dental technicians.
What is the kind of remuneration they could get?
In 2007, the dental technician earned an average salary of about forty thousand dollars annually and an hourly average of about fifteen dollars. These figures are greatly revised over the past few years and are more lucrative. The salary packages vary from state to state in the US and ranges anywhere from forty thousand dollars annually to about seventy thousand dollars and upwards for the experienced.
A Dental technician is a skilled artisan who can create the most beautiful pair of teeth next only to God! This is a career option one should most definitely pursue seriously.