Registered Dental Hygienist in Alternative Practice Program

California Northstate University (CNU) has a Dental Hygiene Board of California (DHBC) approved RDHAP Education Program that satisfies the education requirements for the Registered Dental Hygienist in Alternative Practice (RDHAP) license in California. Dr. Paul Glassman, founder of the RDHAP Program at the University of the Pacific School of Dentistry, is the Program Director of this program. Dr Glassman has 18 years of experience in directing, teaching, and managing an RDHAP Education Program.

Program Organization

CNUs RDHAP Education program is offered as a web-based continuing education program. This course fulfills the DHBC’s requirement for a 150-hour education program needed to apply for the Registered Dental Hygienist in Alternative Practice (RDHAP) license in the State of California.

CNU’s RDHAP Education Program is 4 months in length and is offered on-line. The program is offered two times a year, with a Spring and a Fall session. The first and last days of the course are required live events that take place through live on-line sessions.

During the asynchronous (on-line but not real time) portion of the program, students view presentations, take on-line quizzes, complete other exercises and participate in small learning group on-line discussions using their personal computers. They also prepare assignments, submit clinical case reports and other reports at the end of each section of the curriculum.

In addition, there are 3 required live webinars during the time between the first and last live days of the program.

Topics

Topics covered in this 4-month program are:

  • Dental hygiene technique and theory
  • Oral pathology
  • Pharmacology
  • Sociology, psychology and treatment of special populations, including geriatric, medically compromised, developmentally disabled, pediatric
  • Evaluation of dental hygiene status and dental hygiene treatment planning
  • Medical histories/terminology
  • Dental/medical emergencies
  • Business administration and practice management
  • Radiographic decision making leading to DHBC permission to perform this duty
  • Interim Therapeutic Restorations – Scientific basis

Objectives

Graduates of this program will be able to:

  • Discuss the laws and regulations that apply to RDHAP licensure and practice
  • Use on-line and other resources to find and apply information about dental implication of patient’s health conditions, medications, and other factors that can impact the provision of dental and dental hygiene care.
  • Gather data, develop a dental hygiene assessment and plan dental hygiene treatment for patients with a variety of medical, physical, psychological and social conditions and across the age spectrum.
  • Make arrangements and deliver dental hygiene services in a variety of community locations.
  • Discuss the variety of situations where an RDHAP can apply the knowledge and scope of work authorized by the RDHAP license.
  • Develop and implement a practice plan for an RDHAP practice.
  • Complete DBHC required training on radiographic decision making (RDM)

Dates

The dates for the Fall 2022 session are:

First Day

  • August 26th from 8:00am – 12:00pm a series of live presentations through Zoom
  • The entire class will be divided into small group discussions. You will need to select one of the following Zoom events to attend:
    • August 26th from 1:00pm – 2:00pm through Zoom
    • August 26th from 2:00pm – 3:00pm through Zoom

Live Evening Sessions

  • September 27th from 6 – 7pm – live presentation through Zoom
  • October 25th from 6 – 7pm – live presentation through Zoom
  • November 15th from 6 – 7pm – live presentation through Zoom

Last Date

  • December 2nd from 8:00am – 12:00pm a series of live presentations through Zoom

In between August 26th and December 2nd, there will be a series of on-line recorded modules

**Attendance is required at all live events

Fees

To make the RDHAP Education Program as available as possible, CNU plans to offer the program for $2,495. A non-refundable deposit of $500 will be due at the time of registration and the remaining $1,995 will be due July 22, 2022.

Registration

In order to enroll in the CNU RDHAP Education Program you need to sign up and pay the course fees on the RegPack system.

Register and Pay

Who Can Register?

Any dental hygienist can register, take the course, and receive continuing education credits. This continuing education program satisfies part of the requirements, but is separate from, the process for applying for the RDHAP license in California. The application for the RDHAP license is managed by the Dental Hygiene Board of California (DHBC). Information about the requirements and application for the license are available on the DHBC website.

The requirements for the RDHAP license include 3 components:

  • The RDHAP Education Program (which we are offering) – we will issue a certificate of completion.
  • The academic education requirements (Bachelor’s degree or equivalent) – determined and verified DHBC.
  • The number of practice hours – determined and verified by the DHBC.

CNU’s RDHAP Education Program satisfies requirement #1 above. At the end of the program CNU issues a certificate of completion which can be used to verify the completion of this requirement. Documentation of completion of the other two requirements are submitted directly to DHBC.

Note:

  • The academic education requirements for the RDHAP License includes this requirement language: “The successful completion of 120 semester units or 180 quarter units or a combination thereof shall be considered the equivalent of a bachelor’s degree.” DHBC has informed CNU that they consider the completion of 60 semester units plus the completion of a Registered Dental Hygienist (RDH) education program as satisfying the requirement for education equivalent to the bachelor’s degree. Please contact DHBC for full details or any specific questions about your own situation.
  • The practice hours requirements can be satisfied with direct patient care hours, hours spent teaching involving direct patient care, and hours in public health practice that involve patient care. Please contact DHBC for full details or any specific questions about your own situation.
  • There is no order in which the three requirements for the RDHAP license need to be satisfied. In other words, a dental hygienist could complete the CNU RDHAP Education Program this year even if they have not yet completed the academic education requirements or practice hours requirements. If they need to take some more classes to complete that requirement they could do so in the future. Some hygienists have completed the RDHAP Education Program and then competed the academic requirements several years later and then applied for and received the RDHAP license at that time.

Further details about the requirements and application process for the RDHAP license are available on the Dental Hygiene Board of California website.

Computer Requirements

This on-line program requires access to the latest version of a Web browser such as Microsoft Edge or Google Chrome. In addition, there are assignments that need to be submitted in MS Word format so a word processor that can create files in MS Word format is required (i.e. MS Word, Google Dos, Apple Pages). Finally, the program includes Adobe Acrobat files (PDF format) so the ability to open and read PDF files is required.

Cancellation Policy

There is a non-refundable deposit of $500 due at time of registration.

For participant cancellations received at least two weeks prior to course date, a refund will be issued with the exception of the non-refundable deposit. Refunds will not be issued for participant no-shows or cancellations less than two weeks prior to course date.

This course meets the Dental Board of California’s requirements for 150 units of continuing education.

Contact Information

Paul Glassman DDS, MA, MBA
Professor and Associate Dean for Research and Community Engagement
RDHAP Education Program Director
CNU College of Dental Medicine
9700 West Taron Drive, Elk Grove, CA 95757
Paul.Glassman@cnsu.edu

Maysa Namakian MPH
RDHAP Program Manager
CNU College of Dental Medicine
Maysa.Namakian@cnsu.edu