You are likely enjoying the benefits and rewards of your South Carolina dental hygienist practice. South Carolina’s strong economy, fine schools, cities, and towns, friendly and substantial population, and attractive employment, tax, and recreational environment all add to your reasons to maintain your dental hygienist practice. But if you lose your South Carolina dental hygiene license due to disciplinary charges, you’ll lose all the benefits and rewards of your dental hygiene employment along with it. Don’t risk everything by ignoring or minimizing South Carolina Board of Dentistry disciplinary charges. Retain the LLF National Law Firm’s premier Professional License Defense Team for your best possible disciplinary outcome. Our highly qualified attorneys are available in Charleston, North Charleston, Columbia, Mount Pleasant, Rock Hill, Greenville, Summerville, Goose Creek, Sumter, Florence, Spartanburg, and across the rest of South Carolina. Call 888.535.3686 or complete this contact form now for our premier license defense services.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist License Requirement
You need a current and valid dental hygiene license to continue your practice in the state. South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-80 requires anyone wishing to practice dental hygiene in South Carolina to obtain a license from the Board of Dentistry. It’s all about the license. You cannot gain employment and practice dental hygiene without it. The Act’s Section 40-15-140 states the basic qualifications for licensure as a dental hygienist, including the education, examination, and supervised practice requirements. You know what your dental hygiene license took, including your time, trouble, and finances. The Act’s Section 40-15-120 makes it a criminal misdemeanor to practice dental hygiene in the state without a valid license, punishable by up to a $1,000 fine and two years in jail for each day of an offense. You’ll lose your dental hygiene job if you lose your license. You may lose your freedom if you try to practice without your license. Let us help you preserve your license and protect your employment and practice.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Licensing Authority
The South Carolina Board of Dentistry, within the state’s Department of Labor, Licensing, and Regulation, holds the keys to your dental hygiene license. South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-20 provides for the appointment of dental hygienists to the Board of Dentistry, along with the Board’s dentist members. The Act’s Section 40-15-40 authorizes the South Carolina Board of Dentistry to adopt rules and regulations for the licensure of dental hygienists to practice in the state. The Board of Dentistry is your board as a dental hygienist, not just a board for dentists. Let our attorneys help you communicate, advocate, and negotiate with the Board of Dentistry officials to ensure that you retain your dental hygienist license.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist License Discipline
Once you qualify for your South Carolina dental hygienist license, you must keep it. Your dental hygienist license isn’t a free pass to do as you wish relative to your character and qualifications. You must instead continue to demonstrate to the Board of Dentistry that you can meet its qualifications. South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-190 authorizes the Board of Dentistry to discipline licenses on nineteen enumerated and overlapping grounds. The Act’s Section 40-15-200 states the sanctions that the Board of Dentistry may impose for a disciplinary violation. Those sanctions include license probation, reprimand, limitation, suspension, or revocation. The sanctions further include additional training, monitoring, supervision, psychiatric evaluation, and a fine of up to $10,000. Beware of discipline and its potentially severe sanctions. Get our skilled defense representation.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Misconduct
The South Carolina Board of Dentistry cannot simply make up the grounds on which it pursues your discipline. The Board must instead find statutory grounds on which to act. South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-190’s nineteen grounds for dental hygienist discipline include the following violations:
- attempting to gain your dental hygienist license through credential fraud in the application or examination process;
- felony conviction or conviction for a crime of moral turpitude;
- impaired practice due to physical or mental illness or impairment, or alcohol or substance abuse;
- false or deceptive statements promoting dental or dental hygiene practice;
- failure to maintain sanitary facilities and conditions for dental hygiene;
- failure to provide adequate radiation protection;
- fraud or deceit in the practice of dental hygiene;
- false or misleading statements regarding dental or dental hygiene care and fees;
- false or misleading statements regarding third-party reimbursement for dental or dental hygiene services;
- failure to meet the standard of care for dental hygiene practice;
- violation of the Board of Dentistry dental hygiene rules;
- committing a battery on a patient in the course of dental hygiene practice;
- unlawful dispensing of drugs related to the practice of dentistry or dental hygiene.
Do not misconstrue any of the above Board of Dentistry disciplinary charges as a finding that you committed sanctionable misconduct. Instead, a notice of any of the above charges constitutes an allegation, one that you have the right and opportunity to defend with our skilled and experienced attorneys advocating on your behalf. Board of Dentistry disciplinary charges can be daunting. But use your professional approach to the charges, as you would to anything else in your practice. Get our highly qualified representation so that you can reach the best possible outcome for your charges.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Complaints
South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-180 authorizes the Board of Dentistry to accept and act on complaints against its licensed dental hygienists. The Board of Dentistry carries out that authority by inviting anyone to submit a complaint online detailing the allegations and concerns. Complaints against dental hygienists can come from anyone, including members of the public who have no professional relationship with you but hear about or claim to observe your alleged wrongdoing, even outside of your dental hygiene practice. Common complainants, though, are your patients, colleagues, employer representatives, law enforcement officials, prosecutors, and competitors who may accuse you of deceptive practices. Retain us immediately on learning of a complaint or anticipated complaint against you so that we can help you identify and preserve your defense evidence and communicate as appropriate with the complainant, your employer, and Board of Dentistry officials.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Disciplinary Investigation
The South Carolina Board of Dentistry has the authority and resources to conduct a thorough investigation of any complaint or allegation against you. South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-180 authorizes the Board of Dentistry to evaluate the complaint and, in the case of potential merit, assign an investigator to prepare an investigation report. Section 40-15-180 requires the Board of Dentistry to determine whether to proceed with formal charges based on the investigation report and, if so, to notify the accused dental hygienist in writing of the alleged misconduct. The next Section, 40-15-185, gives the Board’s investigator subpoena powers to compel witness testimony and compel document disclosures. Beware the powers of the Board’s investigator to make a case against you out of statements and documents from others about which you may not even know.
Responding to South Carolina Dental Hygienist Investigation
To level the playing field in your South Carolina Board of Dentistry disciplinary investigation, you should retain us the moment you learn of the investigation. We can help you identify and preserve all material evidence so that you do not face disciplinary charges for obstructing the investigation. We can also help you organize and present your defense evidence during the investigation, if the investigator permits it. Investigators tend to build a disciplinary case through others before approaching the accused dental hygienist. Do not rush to speak with a Board of Dentistry investigator when you are unprepared and may make inaccurate, contradictory, and incomplete responses. Let us help you gather all your defense evidence and respond in an accurate, truthful, prepared, and complete manner. Otherwise, if what you say is inaccurate or incomplete, the Board of Dentistry may use it against you. We may be able to convince the investigator to write a balanced and accurate report that exonerates you of the allegations, causing the Board to forgo any formal charges.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Disciplinary Hearing
You have a constitutional right to due process when facing South Carolina Board of Dentistry disciplinary charges. South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-180 recognizes those rights by requiring that the Board of Dentistry offer you a formal hearing on the disciplinary charges. Section 40-15-180 states expressly that you have the right to hire attorneys of your choice and that your counsel has the right to cross-examine the witnesses against you. We can invoke your hearing rights and use our substantial skill and experience to raise your best hearing defense. We may also be able to arrange conciliation conferences in advance of the hearing at which to advocate and negotiate for voluntary dismissal of the charges, in some cases with an offer of remedial measures in lieu of punitive sanctions. Your goal should be to avoid any disciplinary sanction that may affect your license, reputation, and employment.
Defending South Carolina Dental Hygienist Charges
Our skilled and experienced attorneys can handle your disciplinary proceedings from start to finish. We can answer the disciplinary charges, raising your defenses. We can communicate and negotiate with the Board of Dentistry officials for voluntary dismissal. We can identify your exonerating and mitigating evidence to present in negotiations and at the hearing. We can identify, prepare, and secure the attendance of defense witnesses and conduct their direct examination. We can cross-examine adverse witnesses and challenge adverse documentary evidence. We can also gather, organize, and present your own documentary evidence. We may also retain dental hygienist consultants to review your conduct and testify or opine on your behalf. We can also prepare and file hearing briefs, make hearing arguments, and raise objections to irrelevant and unduly prejudicial evidence.
Mitigating South Carolina Dental Hygienist Sanctions
Some disciplinary cases involve misconduct that the accused dental hygienist must admit. Yet even in those cases, our attorneys may be able to raise a good defense based on mitigating circumstances. The South Carolina Board of Dentistry must do more than simply determine whether misconduct occurred. The Board must also determine whether the misconduct warrants a sanction and, if so, what sanction to impose. A case in mitigation lessens or eliminates the sanction. We may, for instance, be able to show that you acted in reasonable reliance on the direction of others in supervisory positions, you innocently misunderstood or mistook the circumstances, your actions caused no harm, risk, or loss, you have a clean disciplinary record, you have a strong academic and employment record, and you have engaged in remedial evaluation, treatment, or training, so that you are not a practice risk.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Post-Hearing Relief
If you have already lost your formal hearing before the South Carolina Board of Dentistry, South Carolina Dental Practice Act Section 40-15-210 provides for an appeal of your discipline to an administrative law judge. Let us pursue your appeal, seeking a reversal on any grounds available. In the course of your appeal, we may alternatively be able to negotiate a voluntary resolution offering remedial measures in lieu of sanctions. Don’t give up. Let us exhaust all available avenues for relief until we achieve your best possible disciplinary outcome.
South Carolina Dental Hygienist Disciplinary Consequences
In a disciplinary proceeding, you may face potential consequences well beyond the suspension or revocation of your South Carolina dental hygienist license. Those consequences include loss of your employment, income, patient base, reputation, and professional relationships. Don’t underestimate the impact of disciplinary charges. Let us help you avoid all sanctions to preserve your license and reputation.
Premier South Carolina Dental Hygienist License Defense
Your best move is to retain the LLF National Law Firm’s premier Professional License Defense Team for skilled defense of your South Carolina Board of Dentistry disciplinary charges. We help hundreds of dental hygienists and other health professionals successfully defend license disciplinary charges in South Carolina and nationwide. Call 888.535.3686 or complete this contact form now.