Income Protection for Dental Nurses
The dentist's occupational problem is their back. The dental nurse's is their shoulders, and for a different reason.
The nurse works standing, to one side, reaching across with suction and instruments, often with the arm elevated and held still for the length of a procedure. Between patients they handle the decontamination side: instruments, disinfectants and the chemicals that come with it. The sharps are present throughout.
Income protection pays a monthly amount while you cannot work. For a dental nurse the first thing to establish is what the practice actually provides, because it varies a great deal.
The short answer
A dental nurse stands beside the chair rather than bending over it, holding one position with arms raised for every appointment, handling sharps throughout and dealing with decontamination chemicals between patients. Shoulder and neck problems, needlestick injuries and occupational dermatitis are the results, and pay in this role is modest relative to the responsibility.
What actually stops you working
- Shoulder and neck problems from sustained reaching with the arm elevated beside the chair
- Needlestick and sharps injuries, with the testing and anxiety that follow as well as the physical injury
- Occupational dermatitis on hands from gloves, disinfectants and frequent hand hygiene
- Respiratory irritation and sensitisation from decontamination chemicals and from aerosols generated during treatment
- Lower back problems from standing for whole clinical sessions and from stocking and moving supplies
- Hand and wrist conditions from instrument handling and from the decontamination process
Sick pay, if you get any
Varies considerably and is often modest. Dental nurses employed in a private practice have whatever their contract provides, which may be statutory sick pay only in a small practice. Those employed in a hospital or community dental service may be on NHS terms, which escalate with service and are materially better. Because the two are far apart, your own contract is the first thing to check rather than an assumption about the role.
Why the definition of incapacity decides it
The clause matters because the work needs a specific combination: an arm that can be held elevated, hands that tolerate chemicals, and the ability to be beside a chair all day. Somebody with shoulder damage or hand dermatitis is otherwise well and employable, which an any occupation definition will treat as fitness for work. An own occupation definition asks whether you can work as a dental nurse.
The Arm Held Up Is The Occupational Problem
This is specific to the nurse's position and quite different from the dentist's, which is worth drawing out because the two are usually treated as one job.
The dentist leans forward over the patient. The nurse stands to one side, reaching in with suction, a mirror or an instrument, frequently with the upper arm raised away from the body and held still. Static loading of a shoulder in that position is poorly tolerated, and sustained over years it produces the shoulder and neck problems that are common in this role.
Because it builds gradually it is frequently documented before anybody thinks about income protection, and anything already on your records when you apply will be asked about and may affect the terms. That makes arranging cover early in a dental nursing career worth considerably more than arranging it later.
The Decontamination Side Is A Chemical Exposure
Clinical work gets the attention and the time spent in the decontamination room does its own damage.
Instrument disinfectants, surface chemicals and the constant hand hygiene a clinical role requires are a recognised cause of occupational dermatitis, and some of these substances are respiratory sensitisers. Hands that are gloved, washed and sanitised dozens of times a day have a damaged skin barrier, and a damaged barrier in contact with a sensitiser is the mechanism for the problem.
Gloves of the right type, proper ventilation in the decontamination area and looking after your skin all genuinely help, and no policy substitutes for them. Income protection responds to being unable to work whatever the cause, which covers the outcome when it happens anyway.
If you stop
A practice cannot run a surgery safely without a nurse, so a locum or agency nurse is found and the list continues. The job is generally held, which makes this a financial problem rather than an employment one. Where a practice is small, an absence puts real pressure on colleagues, which is worth knowing because it tends to make nurses return before they should.
Check Whether The Practice Provides Anything
Dental nurses in a hospital or community service on NHS terms generally have death in service through the pension scheme, which is worth getting the figure for.
Nurses employed in a private practice frequently have nothing at all, and where a scheme exists it may be linked to pension membership rather than automatic. That is worth checking rather than assuming either way.
Where there is nothing, the figure to work out is what the household would actually lose. For a second income in a household that relies on it for childcare or the car, that is a real number and the premium is modest.
A Qualification That Can Move, With A Gap To Cross
The likely ending is a shoulder that cannot be held in position any more, or skin that cannot tolerate the chemicals, in somebody with a registered clinical qualification.
There are places that qualification goes: treatment coordination, practice management, decontamination lead roles, or dental nurse training. Several involve a period of lower income or further qualification.
A lump sum on diagnosis funds that move, and matters more in a role with modest pay and limited savings capacity, because there is no buffer to cross the gap with.
Common questions
How is this different from cover for a dentist?+
The positions are different and so are the problems. A dentist leans forward over the patient and damages their neck and back. A nurse stands to one side with the arm raised and held still, which loads the shoulder. The nurse also handles the decontamination chemicals, which the dentist largely does not.
What sick pay do dental nurses get?+
It varies a great deal. Nurses on NHS terms in a hospital or community service have occupational sick pay escalating with service. Nurses in a private practice have whatever the contract says, which in a small practice may be statutory sick pay only. Your own contract is the only reliable answer.
Would a needlestick injury be covered?+
Income protection responds to being unable to work through illness or injury however it arose, so any resulting condition that stopped you working would be assessed on that basis. The testing and anxiety that follow a sharps injury are real and, if they stopped you working, would be considered on the same footing.
Would hand dermatitis be covered?+
It would be assessed like any other condition, since the test is whether you are unable to work. The definition is what matters: own occupation asks whether you can work as a dental nurse around those chemicals, while an any occupation policy may find somebody with good skin away from work fit for employment.
My pay is not high. Is cover worth it?+
The calculation is different rather than smaller. The question is what your household loses if that income stops, which for many people is the childcare or the car. Because the amount protected is lower the premium is lower too, so it is worth getting the actual figure before deciding.
Cover that often goes with this
The gaps we most often find sitting next to this one.