Proposed legislation that was designed to establish a licensed midlevel provider model in Washington state will not move forward.
The House Committee on Health Care and Wellness chose to not take action on House Bill 1310 when it came up for a vote February 17. The measure is now dead until the 2012 legislative session.
The bill would have created two licensed providers: a dental therapist, similar to the dental health aide therapist model currently in use in Alaska, and an advanced dental therapist, the advanced dental hygiene practitioner model supported by the American Dental Hygienists' Association, according to an ADA story.
The dental therapist would have practiced under general supervision with liability assigned to the dentist. The advanced dental therapist could practice unsupervised.
The Washington State Dental Association (WSDA) opposed the measure. "It doesn't make economic or practical sense and unnecessarily risks patient safety," according to a statement on the WSDA's website.
The bill proposed a regulatory process that would have created conflicts between regulatory agencies and would have required state subsidies, according to the group.
The WSDA supports an expanded function dental auxiliary model that allows a supervised "dental extender" to place restorations but no extractions, and only after the dentist determines the diagnosis and treatment planning, according to the group's president, Douglas Walsh, DDS.
