title: Mentors matter: relationships that increase the number of oral health professionals serving the underserved.
abstract: Access to oral healthcare is a persistent problem in the United States. One barrier to this multifaceted issue is the shortage of oral healthcare providers who are willing to provide care for underserved populations. Mentoring relationships with oral health professionals is one solution that will increase the number of public oral health professionals. Using narrative inquiry, this interpretive study explored the relationships that public health dental hygienists had with mentors who leveraged their capital to empower those they mentored. The stories of six dental hygienists practicing in public health and four of their mentors were gathered through one or two 60- to 90-minute interviews. Qualitative data analysis was used to untangle and make meaning of their narrations. The findings are reported in the words of dental hygienists and their mentors, wherever possible, to embrace the voice of the participants. The Iroquois legend of The Three Sisters is used as a metaphor to illustrate the mentoring relationship. These mentor relationships, in which there was mutual growth, were built on a symbiotic, natural bond. The dental hygienists recalled relationships with multiple mentors who leveraged their social and political capital to empower and thereby encouraged a career path in public health.
authors.affiliation: Northern Arizona University, College of Health and Human Services, Flagstaff, AZ 86011, USA. Denise.Helm@ nau.edu
authors.forename: Denise
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Muesch Helm
mesh_terms: D002321:Career Choice; D003756:Dental Hygienists / Q000193:education / Q000600:supply & distribution*; D003815:Dentists / Q000706:statistics & numerical data* / Q000600:supply & distribution; D005260:Female; D006297:Health Services Accessibility / Q000458:organization & administration; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D008507:Medically Underserved Area; D008611:Mentors; D011057:Politics; D014481:United States