Being a college educated, licensed dental hygienist in 2025 carried a depth and energy that felt different—stronger, broader, more connected. Adversity can bring communities together. Maybe what we discovered was that with every challenge came a deeper resolve, a shared commitment to find solutions and keep pushing care forward.
This year, National Dental Hygiene Month wasn’t just a calendar event; it was a reminder of who we are becoming as a profession, bigger than the operatory. Today’s hygienist stands for commitment, cooperation, and conversation, values that define a profession evolving with purpose and renewed vigor.
The role of the hygienist has grown far beyond polishing and probing. Across the world, we see motivated professionals pushing boundaries, collaborating with other disciplines to show how oral health connects to total health. Beyond those familiar moments in the operatory lies something bigger: a dedication to lifelong learning and the courage to evolve.
We are embracing new technologies, science, and even our voice. Hygienists are stepping into new arenas and leading the charge toward integrated care, proving that oral health isn’t an isolated topic—it’s the front door to overall well-being. We are the bridge between disciplines and the translators of the story the mouth tells about the body.
We are speaking up—in conferences, journals, podcasts, and community programs—with a confidence rooted in evidence-based knowledge and lived experience. This takes humility, skill, tenacity, relentless curiosity, and can be quite humbling. It takes a reawakened sense of commitment to push beyond the traditional boundaries of hygiene and into a future where anything is possible.
Across every platform, hygienists are writing, mentoring, teaching, and advocating. We’re breaking down old silos that once kept us separate from medicine and instead, we’re building a shared framework that recognizes the mouth as integral to whole-body health. We are defending our role and elevating the profession through leadership, research, and partnership, proving that dental hygiene is both science and service. It hasn’t been easy helping our own profession see how essential our work is to overall human health, but we will continue to try.
Beyond the operatory: A profession finding its voice
We’re steadily earning our place in the broader health-care conversation, presenting data that connects oral and systemic health, championing prevention, and sharing what we see every day in our patients’ mouths: clear signs of inflammation, infection, and imbalance that mirror the body’s overall state.
We are part of something larger and being a dental hygienist is both a calling and a responsibility, defined by spirit, intellect, and the courage to make oral health central to the broader conversation of medicine and well-being. The public has always been our priority, and 2025 reminds us why they must remain at the center of our work—their health and lives depend on it.
Personally, advocating for stronger representation both within dentistry and across the broader medical community has never felt more important. In 2026, I hope to connect with more passionate, forward-thinking hygienists and continue engaging in meaningful, elevating dialogues that move our profession and health care as a whole forward.
One of the most inspiring changes I witnessed this year was the growing sense of unity between generations of dental hygienists. Seasoned RDHs brought wisdom, perspective, and resilience shaped by decades of patient care, while younger hygienists arrived with fresh ideas, digital fluency, and a fearless drive to innovate.
Together, we form a powerful balance, experience meeting energy and tradition blending with transformation. Instead of competing, generations are collaborating and sharing mentorship, technology, and a commitment to elevating the standard of care. The result is a profession that honors its roots while reaching boldly toward the future united by one goal: to protect, educate, and advance the health of every patient who sits in the chair.
I look forward to continued growth, standing alongside colleagues as allies in productive dialogue and challenging conversations that expand our perspective. Ours is a profession defined by curiosity, compassion, and the courage to lead. As we approach 2026, let’s turn our focus from obstacles to opportunities to explore new paths we may not have seen before.
