The Surprising Advantages of Expanded Practice Hygiene and Teledentistry—Interview with Lisa Balint, MPH, EPDH

Have you heard about the expanded practice dental hygiene model in which hygienists practice remotely and utilize teledentistry to provide their patients with exams? Many practice owners believe this arrangement is impractical or that it essentially ‘robs’ them of new patients.

Lisa Balint, MPH, EPDH of Capitol Dental Care is an expanded practice dental hygienist who attests through personal experience that this model is potentially the best example of leveraging true medical-dental integration to increase access to care.

In this interview, Lisa explains how patients in remote areas benefit from having a hygienist next door to their primary care physician, and how teledentistry can actually be a boon to dentists who need to increase production. We also discuss how the right technology can further facilitate medical-dental integration and professional collaboration.

I’m Dr. Bryan Laskin—author, entrepreneur, engineer of solutions that support integration and interoperability and a dentist who’s convinced that the “hub-and-spoke” of expanded practice hygiene is another great way to make dentistry more profitable while putting the patient first.