Dental Professional moving to Hong Kong

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  1. #11

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    Mar 2012
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    Oh, I'm sorry - what is the answer you would like to hear?

    For what it's worth, dental hygienists appear to earn around 55% of median salary in the UK as well, so there's no major difference between here and there.

    Last edited by Gruntfuttock; 27-04-2013 at 12:16 AM.

  2. #12

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    Quote Originally Posted by MCDC:
    Every time that I've seen the dentist in HK, I've never seen a hygienist. The doctor did all the cleaning, brushing, etc.
    The company I work for employs 1 dentist and I know she has 2 "nurses" that work for her. They have no special training/education and received all training on the job. Their main job duties are taking x-rays, receptionist work, and cleaning. Their lack of training would explain the low salary.
    Thanks for that MCDC.

    Your reply helps and ties in with my conclusion that many dentists do not employ a hygienist.

    In the UK, a dentist will employ a hygienist/therapist to perform more routine procedures like scaling and polishing, fillings etc. This frees up the dentist to focus on more complex procedures thus reducing patients waiting times.

    This only applies to a busy dental practice however.

    If a dentists surgery isn't doing too great for business then employing a hygienist/therapist wouldn't be wise because it would be passing their much needed money on to someone else.

    It seems that the role of a dental nurse is similar in Hong Kong.

  3. #13

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    Don't apologise Gruntfuttock.

    If you're implying that UK hygienist/therapist walk away with around £1,000 a month then you are wrong. This may be the case working part time working 1 or 2 days a week, that's why I thought the position advertised with the poor salary was a part time position.

    Thanks anyway


  4. #14

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    Apologies, I mistyped the previous post, what I meant was that dental hygienists earn a salary at about the 55th percentile of salary (i.e. a little above median) in the UK. Which is about the same position relative to the median as in HK.

    The median salary in HK is a little over half that in the UK. The mean salary figures in Hong Kong are very badly skewed by a small number of people gambling with other people's money and taking a large proportion of it. Real jobs are not particularly well paid compared to other developed countries.

    Last edited by Gruntfuttock; 27-04-2013 at 01:00 AM.

  5. #15

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    Quote Originally Posted by Bruno.:
    If you're implying that UK hygienist/therapist walk away with around £1,000 a month then you are wrong. This may be the case working part time working 1 or 2 days a week, that's why I thought the position advertised with the poor salary was a part time position.

    Thanks anyway
    Ummmm, not sure what you are expecting but you will never get a similar wage compared to the UK. I suggest you do your own research and ask surgeries directly. You might be able to get to 15k a month but above that is going to be difficult.

    Sent from somewhere....

  6. #16

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    2 points -

    1. It would not be cost effective for most dental surgeries in HK to employ hygienists because of the cost of rent - it would probably mean renting extra surgery space, which would cost rather more per month than the hygienist's salary - and most individual dentist chair rooms here are not much bigger than the stall of a disabled person's toilet in western countries (even including the receptionist's/ waiting area, think around 150 - 200 ' sq.) Although I suspect many geoexpatters will be going to rather plusher premises

    2. If dental hygienist "wanted" ads follow the pattern of ads for other paraprofessionals in HK, more than 95% of the ads will be in Chinese.