Canada has a dental assistant shortage. Experts worry it’ll only get worse

There is a shortage of dental assistants in Canada, leaving some experts worried about the future of the industry and its ability to give proper oral health care to Canadians.

A shortage of dental assistants across Canada may cause a backlog in oral health care and could impact dentists’ capacity to take on new patients, experts warn.

The dental assistant shortage has been happening for years now, according to Lynn Tomkins, president of the Canadian Dental Association (CDA), and with the federal government’s new dental care plan for Canadians, she worries that without proper staffing, many dentists may not be able to meet the patient demand.

“The shortage of dental assisting is the number one issue for dentists across the country,” she said. “So dentists have had to alter their hours, in some cases reduce their hours because they don’t have the support staff, just like operating rooms and hospitals. They don’t have the nurses, you can’t do the treatment.”

Even before COVID-19 hit the health-care system, there was a shortage of dental assistants in Canada, she said.

The CDA states that in 2019, up to a third of Canadian dental offices were looking to add a dental assistant to their staff.

“COVID-19 exacerbated this problem,” Tomkins said, noting that the pandemic pushed the Canadian health-care system to the brink, causing front-line staff workers, including dental assistants, to leave the profession.

“People have perhaps gone into other areas to work remotely and dentistry cannot be done remotely,” she said.

Tomkins estimates that there is a current “shortage of almost 5,000 dental assistants” in Canada.