Did you know that the Blue Whale doesn’t have any teeth, even though it’s the largest mammal in the world? Though the average person going to the dentist may not know this, dental assistants are there to educate their patients and give them fun facts to help them take their dental hygiene seriously.
To be a dental assistant, you have to go through an extensive process and practice the interview questions and answers so you are on your game during the interview. We are here to prep you on the 7 common dental assistant interview questions and answers.
School is in Session
Before you have an interview for a dental assistant position, you go to dental school. Programs are 10 months long and there are different levels of school that you can choose.
Level I includes chair-side assisting duties and Level II helps you with intra-oral duties. Depending on which path you choose, it will help you determine the role you look for after school.
Once you complete or during school, you may have internships or have real-time experience hours in a dentist’s office. Then, you are ready to start prepping for your first big interview.
Key Interview Questions and Answers
Now, we will walk you through the 7 common dental assistant interview questions answers:
1. Tell me a little about yourself.
Here, you can talk about school, your past experiences or previous job history and what you would add to the office as a dental assistant. Make sure not to focus on your personal life and what you say is relevant to the position.
2. Why did you choose the career of a dental assistant?
Here you can start off with the honest reasons behind your career choice and why you decided to take your career in the path of contributions to the dental field. Whether you have a personal story or a certain aspect of the duties of a dental assistant drew you to the job, emphasize whatever was most important to you.
3. What are your strengths?
Explain what strengths you have that would make you a good fit for the position. Tell a short story about one of your strengths and how it helped you in a dental situation.
4. What are your weaknesses?
Answer this positively – you care too much or you are too detail-oriented. Find something that you can twist from a negative into a positive trait for the dental world.
5. What is your oral hygiene routine?
This is where you take the knowledge you learned in school and translate it to educating patients on improving dental hygiene. Show off your healthy smile during your interview, to display that you practice what you preach.
6. Have you ever dealt with an unhappy patient? How did you deal with it?
This is where you can show the dentist that you have good customer service and patience with answering customers’ questions. Make sure to state the problem, the solution you came up with and how the situation ended. Dealing with uncomfortable patients is a part of the job so making sure you can create a calm space is key.
7. How will you make sure you follow HIPPA guidelines?
Study HIPPA protocol before your interview and give an example from school or real-life experience where you put it into practice. For example, you could talk about patient privacy and that you only use patients’ first names in the waiting room and keep information and discussions about patients protected and behind closed doors.
Interview Ready
Now that you have all of the tools and interview questions and answers, you are ready for your dental assistant interview.
Take the knowledge you learned from school and the skills you learned from internships or real-life experience at a dentist’s office.
Another tip is to ask the dentist a few questions, two you could ask are how long the average dental assistant has worked there to make sure it’s a good office environment and what you think the most valuable skill for a dental assistant is you so can confirm you’re the right person for the job.
Start prepping for your first interview or read up to date dental tips and news here!