Securing Public Trust: Dentistry, SARS-CoV-2, and "Testing for Tomorrow"

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic created societal upheaval well beyond what anyone, but the oldest of Americans, has seen in their lifetime. As the pandemic begins to subside, it is leaving behind a legacy of permanently changed practices, including enhanced environmental controls in clinical settings, reconsideration of modes of personal protective equipment outsourcing, changes and/or reinterpretation of dental practice acts, and entirely new approaches to testing and vaccine design, among many others. This article focuses on one change that the authors hope will prevail: greater trust in the dental profession as a valuable public resource during healthcare crises. The article cites the initial low perception of dentistry as an important component of a health surge response by public health authorities, then describes how a group of eight institutions came together to form the "Testing for Tomorrow Collaborative" to help each other and the dental profession identify modes of testing and practice conduct that make dentistry safer to practice. The importance of the public's trust in the profession is underscored, and pathways to improving that trust are proffered.