Dentist CV Examples & Writing Guide

This sample is for a general dental practitioner with five years as an associate after Dental Foundation Training and a year of dental core training in hospital. She has worked for a corporate dental group and a private group practice. The name and practices are made up. New graduates and specialists: the sections further down show how to adapt the same layout.

Most dentist CVs are read by a practice owner, a practice manager or a corporate group's clinical recruiter with an empty surgery that costs money every day it sits unused. They check four things first.

• Registration and Performers List status, today. Full GDC registration, inclusion on the NHS Performers List (needed for NHS work in England; Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland have their own arrangements), or exactly where you are in the process. They will check the GDC's online register, so be precise. Indemnity cover and hepatitis B immunity come up early too.
• Activity and volume. Patients a day, UDAs delivered against contract, private gross fees, treatment acceptance. A self-employed associate is judged on these, and "provided quality dental care" gives them nothing to compare.
• Procedure mix and what you refer out. Molar endo, surgical extractions, implants, clear aligners, children, sedation. A practice with long referral waits needs a dentist who keeps more in-house; a busy NHS contract wants speed on restorative. Counts per year answer this.
• Technology and software. Software of Excellence, Dentally or R4; CEREC or another same-day crown system; iTero or Primescan; CBCT. Switching software costs them weeks of your activity.

“I look at the registration line, then gross per day and how many patients that took. If someone lists molar endo and third molars with real numbers, that is a dentist I can put in a surgery tomorrow without building a referral network around them.”

Every dentist working in the UK must be registered with the General Dental Council (GDC). UK graduates register with a BDS from a GDC-approved dental school; most then complete a year of Dental Foundation Training (DFT; Vocational Training in Scotland) in an NHS training practice, which is the usual route onto the NHS Performers List in England. Dentists who qualified overseas generally register by passing the GDC's Overseas Registration Exam (ORE) or another route the GDC accepts. Check the GDC and your nation's NHS rules and write your stage exactly.

Three to four lines: title and years, your activity and volume, the scope you keep in-house, your technology, and your registration status. A new graduate replaces gross fees with clinical case counts and DFT or hospital experience. Skip the career objective; the practice knows what an associate dentist wants.

Each bullet should carry one of: a volume (patients, procedures, UDAs, gross fees), a rate (acceptance, referral, audit compliance) or a scope marker (a procedure many general dentists refer out). Below, common lines from dentist CVs rewritten. Use your own practice software report numbers; owners will ask to see them.

Group the skills so a reader can see your clinical range, your technology and your practice sense in three glances. Name specific procedures and systems; "excellent clinical skills" is not a skill. Twelve to sixteen lines is enough.

• Clinical: comprehensive examinations and treatment planning, composite and ceramic restorations, crown and bridge, molar and anterior endodontics, simple and surgical extractions (third molars, if you do them), implant restoration or placement, removable prosthodontics, clear aligners, paediatric restorative, periodontal therapy (root surface debridement, if you perform it), urgent and trauma care.
• Sedation and medical: inhalation sedation, IV sedation with midazolam (training to IACSD standards), care of medically complex patients, treatment under general anaesthesia if you have hospital (DCT) experience.
• Technology: practice software (Software of Excellence, Dentally, R4), intraoral scanners (iTero, Primescan, Trios), same-day crowns (CEREC), CBCT (Planmeca, Carestream), digital radiography, intraoral cameras, 3D printing for models and guides if used.
• Practice and business: treatment presentation and valid consent, UDA targets and private gross, NHS banding and FP17 claims, CQC compliance, UK GDPR and patient confidentiality, decontamination (HTM 01-05), radiography under IR(ME)R, team leadership and supervising foundation dentists.
• Languages: list them; a second language spoken by local patients is a real hiring factor for many UK practices.

A new graduate has no gross fees, and practices know that. UK graduates enter Dental Foundation Training through national recruitment, so the CV matters most for the first associate job after DFT, private roles and locum work. Employers want to see how many procedures you did at dental school and in DFT, whether you have treated patients outside the school clinic, and whether your registration and Performers List status will be ready when the surgery is. Looking for a dental nurse or hygienist CV instead? Those are different documents; this section assumes a BDS.

1. 1Header with your status and dates: GDC registered, DFT completed or completion date, Performers List status. Add BLS.
2. 2Personal statement of three lines: BDS and year, your clinical case counts, your DFT practice or DCT post, your software and imaging.
3. 3Education first: dental school, degree, year, prizes and distinctions. Add a Clinical Experience line with counts: crowns, root canals, extractions, dentures, paediatric patients, implant restorations.
4. 4Outreach placements, community dental service sessions and volunteer clinics as Experience, with patients a day and procedure types. Six weeks of outreach seeing 10 patients a day is worth more to an owner than any module list.
5. 5DFT and any DCT post above dental school clinic work; hospital experience signals speed and comfort with complex patients.
6. 6Skills and technology, then audits, research, publications or leadership only if they fit. One to two pages; two is normal in the UK once you have DFT and a hospital post.

• Length: two pages is normal in the UK for associates; one to two for foundation dentists. Owners and corporate recruiters read the first half page and the registration line.
• Order: header (degrees after your name, GDC registration, Performers List, BLS), personal statement, experience with numbers, registration and qualifications, education, skills, then CPD highlights (implant or sedation courses), audits, publications or teaching if relevant.
• CV or resume? In the UK the CV is the normal document for practice and corporate jobs. Specialty training and DCT posts usually go through national application forms, and academic or hospital posts may want a longer CV with every rotation, audit, publication and presentation. In the US a "resume" is the short practice document and a "CV" the long academic one, and practising there needs a US state licence, which GDC registration does not give you.
• Layout: single column, standard fonts, no photo, no date of birth. The GDC number can go on the page or be offered on request. Large corporate groups use applicant tracking systems, so keep it text-based; the cvplex dentist template is built that way.
• Keywords to mirror from the advert when true for you: general dental practitioner, associate dentist, BDS, GDC registered, Performers List, UDA, NHS, private, mixed practice, restorative, endodontics, oral surgery, implants, Invisalign or clear aligners, CEREC, CBCT, Software of Excellence or Dentally, treatment planning, sedation.
• CPD: list the courses that changed your scope (implant placement, IV sedation, aligner certification), not every CPD hour. The GDC sets verifiable CPD requirements over a five-year cycle; employers care about what you can now do.