I am against any type of legislation like this.  I was reading something last night from Kellogg, the guy who is supporting the mid-level providers.  To support his case for mid-levels providers he talks about the increasing costs of dental care.  He says that the cost of dental care is increasing faster than the rate of inflation.  This medical training will require time away from our practices and financial resources.  These fees will then be passed onto the dental patient in terms of higher fees than what we are already charging.  Is this what we really want?  Are Kellogg's stats wrong?

I go once a month to an infusion center where chemotherapy is administered.  On numerous occasions over the past four years I have witnessed medical emergency with the administration of chemotherapy.  In every instance I am amazed at the staff and their response to the emergencies.  Does this take training and practice?  Of course it does.  Are we administering drugs that frequently require a response like this?  I don't think so.  I would have to say that most dentists go their entire careers and never have a medical emergency like what I see in the infusion center.  I thank God for that.  I say all this to say, that medical emergencies are rare in the dentist office.  I am not against being prepared for medical emergencies in the dental office but I am against mandating that dentists be required to go to this extreme of medical emergency preparedness.   CPR training has been good enough for all these years.  ACLS training is already required for those doing sedation.  This seems like an additional step to ACLS training.

Thank you for the opportunity to express my opinion.