I don't agree with allowing dental assistants to scale teeth!!! As a dental professional, I was trained and went to school to learned alot in school; not only how to scale but all the body systems, drugs, illnesses, and nutrition to name a few.  If all this is not necessary to scale teeth, then why is the dental hygienist required to do that? We had to pass a very hard board exam and take a state exam of scaling  a patient's teeth. Why all of the sudden does this training not need to be heeded? Im totally disgusted that people especially dentists are for this. In my opinion, the dentists are only for this because it will lead  to them having to pay less to the clinician and charge the patient more as health care cost rises. If this happens, every patient should be told they will be charged the same price for qualified teeth scaling and cleaning or a half-way job by a DAll!!!!!!!!!! Please stop this madness!!!!!! Does my degree mean nothing?