Extended-duties Dental Nurses
Extended-duties Dental Nurses work within the dental team providing a range of specialised services in support of patient care. An Extended-duties Dental Nurse may choose to enhance their scope of practice through specialising in delivering support for procedures such as inhalational or intravenous sedation. They may seek to offer care and support directly to patients through taking radiographs (xrays), taking impressions or offering oral health advice and treatments directly for patients.
Extended-duties Dental Nurses can expect to work in a range of different settings from high street dental practices to NHS health board sites.
Extended-duties Dental Nurses must have already achieved a registerable qualification at SCQF Level 7 and be GDC-registered before undertaking a wide range of qualifications that can enhance their ‘scope of practice’. These additional qualifications including SQA Professional Development Award (PDA) qualifications aligned to SCQF Levels 7-9 and cover topics as diverse as radiography; food and health, inhalation and intravenous sedation, dental impression taking and orthodontic dental nursing. Equivalent courses are offered through the NEBDN.