Professional support for the role of the dental therapist in the dental team has been widely accepted in Australia and New Zealand, where their role came about in response to population need from the rising numbers of caries prevalence in children. This same support has not followed in all countries, with the United States referring to dental therapists as ‘lower level practitioners’ with a study showing 75% of US paediatric dentists not knowing what a dental therapist was and 71% of them disagreeing to add them as part of the dental team.