OCR Text |
Show THE SEARCHLIGHT [s There A Dental Trust? If you have an aching tooth, pay no atte ntion to it. Use vour will power to reduce the pain. The dentist is busy with more import ant matters, and dentists are scarce. If you are an old gummer and have finally raked and seraped together enough to get you some store teeth—dentures to the elite—forget it. Stick to your soup and stew. The dentist is busy and dentists are scaree. Has the war taken all the dentists ont of Utah? By no means. Then why are dentists so scarce in Utah? Has somebody engineered an artificial scarcity of dentists to promote bigger and juicier profits? It looks that way. Within the last 90 days, and with no especial effort, we have traced the cases of three qualified dentists residing in Salt Lake City who want to practice but who cannot. The explanation is simple. Utah has an aggregation of gentlemen who have banded themselves together into a Dental Association. They put collective pressure on law makers. They prescribe ethics, regulations and policies, some of which they ram through the Legislature to give them the force of law. They nominate and control the board of dental examiners who are empowered to give professional examinations. All of those things they do in the interest—the financial interest—of the associated gentlemen. The public welfare, if considered at all, is wholly secondary. The dental profession in Utah is the only one of the healing arts in this State that refuses to encourage reciprocal exchange of members of the profession with other states. The national organization pursues a similar policy. If a dentist moves from one state to another he has a difficult time getting re-established. Technical examinations are given that would stump two-thirds of the dentists in Utah. They eall it ‘‘preserving high standards.’’ But they use it actively to regulate the admission of new dentists. The dentist who has been in practice twenty years has forgotten much of the technical paper phase of dentistry, much as the business man ten years away from algebra would fail to work the simplest equation. But the dentist who has been in practice twenty years certainly knows his business, and, unless there are moral or other justifiable grounds for excluding him, he should be admitted with a minimum of red tape and fuss. We have in mind a certain dentist who formerly practiced in Utah. Twenty years ago he went to the Pacific Coast intending to locate there permanently. A few months ALO he decided to return to Utah. He is a man of fine character and excellent qualifications. He knows his profession. But it is doubtful whether he could pass a technical examination without a period of research and study, which he cannot afford. In the meantime Utahns must do without his services because of arbitrary regulations set up at the instance of the Dental Association. The pretense is made that Utah will accept reciprocal exchange of dentists with any state that will accord Utah dentists the same priv- lege. The forty-eight states are all willing to reciprocate if the other state will. But the Dental Associations, in one way and another —prineipally another—see that no State makes the first break. Why not admit to practice in Utah any dentist in good standing from any state? Certainly the public interest would be better served. An Administrative Court Judgment. should be reserved for the pres- ent concerning the proposed Administrative Court to take over powers now vested in the Industrial and Public Service Commissions. If utility regulation and labor relations are taken from practical administrators, lowered efficiency is certain. Kilowatt reform might be set back a decade. An administrative court would be less sympathetic with disabled workers, and far less responsive to the general welfare than the pres- ent Pubhe Service Commission. If such a court is established the judgeship or judgeships should be elective rather than appointive. Who would have much faith in an Administrative Court appointed by Herbert B. Maw, by and with the consent and approval of Gus P. Backman? |