Career satisfaction of Pennsylvanian dentists and dental hygienists and their plans to leave direct patient care.
The aim of this study is to explore a number of practice-related dynamics between dentists and dental hygienists, including their career dissatisfaction, plans to leave direct patient care, hiring difficulties, and full-time work.



Data come from the 2013 Pennsylvania Health Workforce Surveys, a sample of 5,771 dentists and 6,023 dental hygienists, and logistic regression is used to estimate the relationships between outcome areas - dissatisfaction, plans to leave patient care, and hiring/job outcomes - and a number of explanatory variables, including demographic and practice characteristics.



Dentists working in practices that employ hygienists have lower odds of reporting overall dissatisfaction and of leaving patient care in the next 6 years than those that do not employ hygienists. Dental hygienists that work full-time hours across two or more jobs have higher odds of dissatisfaction than those who work full-time in one job only. Part-time work in a single hygienist job is associated with higher odds of leaving the career, relative to having a single, full-time job.



Results suggest that employment of dental hygienists is associated with lower career dissatisfaction and extended careers for dentists. However, a number of dentist characteristics are associated with difficulty hiring hygienists, including rural practice, nonwhite race, and solo ownership. Only 37.5 percent of hygienists work in a single, full-time job, an outcome related to lower dissatisfaction and extended careers for hygienists. Characteristics associated with this job outcome include having an associate degree, having a local anesthesia permit, and not working for a solo practice.
Department of Economics, Indiana University of Pennsylvania, Indiana, PA, USA.
Brandon
B
Vick
D000328:Adult; D002322:Career Mobility; D003756:Dental Hygienists / Q000523:psychology*; D003815:Dentists / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007588:Job Satisfaction; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010414:Pennsylvania; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016526:Workload
Pennsylvania; dental hygienist; dentist; job satisfaction; solo practice