The ADHA is not under attack: Hygienists are asking for change
A recent three-part series of podcasts released by Endeavor’s A Tale of Two Hygienists has caused a ripple effect in the dental hygiene community. The first podcast was ADHA Membership Renewal? followed by ADHA Pt 2: Unnecessary Hulabaloo, and the latest episode was ADHA Pt 3: Are There Really Benefits? Let's Explore!
In each of these episodes, areas of concern are discussed about the direction that past national leadership has taken. While it can be painful to air the truth, the dental hygiene community has embraced it. We have received hundreds of messages of support and encouragement—from everyday clinicians to influencers and even our corporate partners. They have petitioned us to keep working toward righting the ship and making the professional association whole again.
As a profession, we’re in dire need of a strong association, as we are challenged routinely. Illinois and Kansas have now given dental assistants the opportunity to provide supragingival scaling. Massachusetts just approved foreign dentists to acquire dental hygiene licensure, while Minnesota passed a bill allowing dental assistants the ability to administer local anesthetic. If these changes are alarming to you, you’re not alone. While the state-level leaders of the ADHA have done their absolute best to fight this, they cannot do it alone. They need support at the national level.
Where are the ADHA members?
Diminishing membership numbers, among other significant issues, have been a challenge for our association. The national organization speaks on behalf of the profession, but it has been estimated that less than 10% of all hygienists nationally are members.
Here lies the greatest challenge for our profession—members are needed. RDHs do not feel they’re receiving value from the national association. The national association does not communicate with nonmembers, and membership has declined. So, who is to blame when our scope of practice is encroached upon, the professional or the association?
There are many reasons dental hygienists choose not to be members of our professional association. We recently had the opportunity to meet with a grassroots group of hygienists who shared the reasons they’re not members, reasons that we’ve heard many times before, including high cost, lack of trust, lack of value, disproportionate allocation of funds to state versus national, and many more.
Our association has been struggling for many years, and it’s time to open the doors at the national level of the ADHA to sweep out the bad and bring in the good. Share the past, reveal the truths, admit the mistakes, and start from square one with open communication, collaboration, innovation, and routine high-quality messaging. This should be messaging that comes from the association to the members of the profession, not just the members of the association. We cannot drive change and increase membership without comprehensive understanding by dental professionals of the goings on in the association, member or not.
Where does this change begin? We will be conducting a survey with all readers of RDH magazine in the near future, whether they’re ADHA members and not. If you want to lend your voice to change, send us a message.
