Dental/dental hygiene trainees discuss bias, managing patient expectations, trust, and race. (2023)
The thing is is, like, well, I don’t know how they’re treating their patients. I don’t know what they’re doing to their patients. But the thing is, is patients that can sense… You know what I mean? It’s that intangible feeling of, like, “I don’t feel comfortable with this person.” Like that girl I had who had the professor that was just forcing this on her, it’s that level of… It’s an untouchable thing. You can’t put a name to it, but she just was not feeling settled. She didn’t feel like she was trusting the process. You know what I mean? . . . So I feel like what a lot of what I’ve observed is, tends to be microaggressions. I don’t often see full-blown racial… I don’t know if that’s being thrown around, but it’s more microaggressions, I would say. I’ve definitely observed microaggressions. I’m not going to beat around the bush. I’ve definitely seen it.