Giving patients back their smile

My orthodontic journey started when I worked as locum dental nurse in an orthodontic practice while preparing for my overseas registration examination. My first day went very quickly and it was fast paced compared to general dentistry. After working for one week and observing the qualities of the general team, I decided this was an area of dentistry in which I wanted to work. I was able to adapt to orthodontic nursing/assistant very fast and went through work-based training complemented by the knowledge acquired from university.

This, I believe, is a similar approach that will be adopted by the purposed orthodontic therapist apprenticeship. The desire to be part of the team that gives a patient back their smile was a great driving force along with determination to succeed. You need to possess good manual dexterity and coordination and good eyesight, too – all valuable qualities needed to handle orthodontic appliances/instruments.