License renewal season is in full swing in Georgia. Every 2 years, dentists and dental hygienists go through the process of renewing their licenses and, where applicable, sedation permits. As part of a collaboration with the Board of Healthcare Workforce, the Georgia Board of Dentistry is also collecting additional information about dental practice in the state. The new survey has required additional troubleshooting for some seeking to renew their license.

To successfully complete the survey, it helps to know a couple of things:

First, the Board’s survey is designed to report errors at the top of the screen. If the survey will not submit, check the list at the top to see which fields are reporting back as an error. In some cases, an unmarked checkbox at the start of a section may cause multiple fields to return as incomplete. This is primarily a concern in the sections of the survey about practice location. A dentist with a single office should check the boxes indicating no second or third practice location to be sure blank fields in these sections are not marked as errors.

Second, the 3 teledentistry questions after the first should be left untouched if a dentist is not providing teledentistry services. The section will begin with a “no” answer followed by 3 additional questions about time. Leaving those fields untouched will display a light grey text that reads “1% to 100%” (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Teledentistry Question with a “No” Answer

Questions that continue to get flagged, or submissions where no obvious cause can be identified, should be reported to the Board for review via their contact form. Georgia Dental Association’s Government Affairs team is also on standby to help troubleshoot any challenges that arise during the renewal process.