title: The establishment of a course to train dental hygienists in South Australia: an evaluation after three years.
abstract: South Australia was the first State to legislate for the introduction of dental hygienists in Australia. A training course was established in 1975, and accepted ten trainees each year until 1980. The course was one year full-time, and it's content was based initially on recommendations by the General Dental Council of Great Britain for the training of hygienists. This was augmented with increased content in the behavioural science area and a topic approach to programming. The nature of the programme, selection, and assessment of students is discussed. Indications are that the course is well accepted by the majority of hygienists and their employing dentists from both the public and private sector.
mesh_terms: D001315:Australia; D003479:Curriculum; D003756:Dental Hygienists / Q000193:education*; D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D006801:Humans