Dental by Design

Their words, not mine. I have an actual 24-carat gold-plated Gracey curette embedded in glass that I received, along with the respect (and envy) of my peers. This award meant a lot to me when I received it, but it hasn't made any actual difference in my career. In nearly fourteen years, I have yet to encounter any dental hygiene emergencies that would necessitate my breaking that glass for the scaler inside. But I keep it nearby just in case. At my home, of course, as there are plenty of other scalers to use at work.

I have worked in private practice my entire career. Being married to a nomad, I have relocated multiple times since graduating from hygiene school. I have lived and worked in Illinois, Indiana, Missouri, Colorado, and now Iowa. As a result, I have worked in my fair share of dental offices. These varied from the tiny single-doctor practice to the three-story, fifteen-doctor, seventy-employee conglomeration.

By the way, that last practice was also single-doctor owned. And the story of his rise and fall is worth telling. You’ll have to wait for that one, but I’ll leave you with a solid piece of advice: blind faith in your office manager is a terrible business plan.

Having the opportunity to work with so many brilliant dental professionals throughout my career, with their extensive knowledge and skill sets, has been an enormous boon to my professional development. I genuinely believe I wouldn't be the hygienist I am today without all of the input I have received from such an eclectic group of experts.

Working directly with periodontists, oral surgeons, endodontists, myofunctional therapists, sleep and airway specialists, and orthodontists throughout my career has broadened the range of experiences that shape my professional practice.

So why am I telling you all of this on a page that's supposed to be about content creation and social media strategy? Fair question. Let me back up.

Before I was a dental hygienist, I spent the better part of a decade working for a public utility company. I started on the phones in customer service before moving into a more administrative role in the Customer Solutions Group, which sounds fancier than it was, but it did get me off the phones and onto more challenging projects. One of which was the rewrite of all of the company's official customer-facing correspondence. My peers had a hard time understanding why I was so excited to be assigned such a ghastly project. They didn’t know I was the girl in school who loved an essay or composition assignment.

I also co-founded and published a monthly newsletter for a department of 250+ employees, communicating policy changes and training updates in a way that was digestible, entertaining, and easy to understand. With colors and graphics that grabbed attention, at least for their time in the early 2000’s.

Then I spent sixteen years doing a different version of the same job: taking complicated clinical information and translating it into the right language for the human sitting in front of me in the dental chair. Along the way, I built a professional network spanning five states, two careers, and sixteen years of contacts - actual human relationships with patients and colleagues.

Somebody once told me I have a gift for making people feel comfortable and opening up. Whatever that says about me, it's served me well in two seemingly unrelated careers.

All the while, I’ve been nurturing my personal passion - writing. Over the years, I’ve written essays, short stories, created blogs, published research-heavy articles, dabbled in poetry, and I even have two books in progress (one a work of fiction, the other non-fiction).

In the fall, I took a soul-searching nature walk along the Boulder Creek Path in, you guessed it - Boulder, Colorado. The question I was searching my soul and nature for answers to? “Is leaving Colorado the right thing for my family and me right now?” I was expecting answers to appear in the moving water of the creek, but it didn’t happen. Shocking, I know. But as I gave up and turned to walk away from the creek and back to the path I had strayed from, something caught my eye on the ground near a tree. It was just a gray stone, half-buried in the dirt. I don’t know why I felt the need to pry it loose and pick it up. Until I picked it up and turned it over. That’s when I saw that it had been hand-painted, orange with blue and white flowers, and the words “Begin Again.”

Look, I know how this sounds. And I promise I don’t usually seek answers in bodies of water. I do pick up random rocks, but that’s an entirely different issue. This is one of those times when truth is definitely stranger than fiction. I don’t know what else to tell you.

It took us from the fall of 2025 to the spring of 2026, but we did ultimately decide to “begin again.” Which brings us to Iowa City, where I’ve been unpacking, waiting for my Iowa dental hygiene license, and contemplating a career shift. For one thing, I’m getting restless. But also? That stone was pretty convincing. “Begin Again.”

2026 is the Year of the Fire Horse, which, according to the Chinese zodiac, carries the energy of independence, confidence, and forward momentum. So I’m going to take my rock and hurl it forward with confidence, in the spirit of the Fire Horse. That metaphor could use some work. What I’m trying to say is, Amanda R McHenry, Writer/RDH, is launching Dental by Design - a content creation/social media consulting venture.

I know what dental practices need to say. And I know how to say it in a way that makes their patients want to hear more. If you have a patient engagement issue (from “non-existent” to simply “needs a fresh pair of eyes”), I would be thrilled to offer you my services.

Let’s talk about what Amanda R McHenry, RDH, and Dental by Design can do for you, your practice, and most importantly, your patients. Learn all the ways to contact me here.