As a dental hygienist, I spent my schooling learning about whole-body health, oral manifestations of health conditions, periodontal disease and all of its related conditions and symptoms, as well as ways to treat it, among many other aspects of patient health. To give dental assistants the ability to scale and subtract from one of the healthcare providers on the frontline of preventive and diagnostic care with whom patients usually spend most of their time will prove to be a disservice at the very least, if not dangerous.