Winter 2017-18

25 nmdental.org Dental Hygiene—Genesis to Now By Shelly Fritz— New Mexico Dental Journal Editor Dr. D.D. Smith of Philadelphia lectured on using periodic oral prophylaxis and educating his patients on home oral health care in 1898. One of his followers, Dr. Alfred C. Fones, in 1906 trained his cousin, Irene Newman, to scale and polish teeth and instruct their patients on daily home care. In 1910, The Ohio College of Dental Surgery trained the first hygienists, but closed the school in 1914 because the Ohio dentists were vehemently opposed. So the students never worked as hygienists. But Dr. Fones opened his own school in Connecticut, and graduated his first students a year later. A year after that, the Connecticut Dental Practice Act included the regulation of dental hygienists. The rest of the country followed state by state. Jack Orio was the first male hygienist, in the world, graduating from UNM in 1965 joining 15,400 hygienists in the country. There are dental hygienists all over the world with China opening its first dental hygiene school in 1996. Ann Dinius, a past UNM Dental Hygiene Program Director, worked for the World Health Organization opening schools in the Netherlands and Iran. Irene Navarre, now 100 years old, helped Dr. Monica Novitski, a local pedodontist, found the UNMDivision of Dental Hygiene in 1961 in Albuquerque. The other three NM CODA accredited programs are San Juan Community College in Farmington, NMSU/Doña Ana Community College in Las Cruces, and the Pima Medical Institute in Albuquerque. The UNM Division of Dental Hygiene now has three academic programs, an entry-level Bachelor’s degree, a Bachelor’s degree completion program for dental hygienists with an Associate degree and a Master of Science program in dental hygiene. The graduate program was the first of its kind west of the Mississippi. Over the years, hygienists can administer local anesthesia, work under general supervision, are self-regulated, licensed by credentials, practice collaboratively, and have Medicaid provider status.