What does your dental practice website have to say?

Yes, and in one state it is not even a question of interpretation: Texas has a rule whose title is “Website Disclosures” and which lists four things a dental practice website should clearly disclose. Everywhere else the definitions do the work — the rules govern “advertisements” and “public communications”, defined by function rather than format, so a page that describes your services and invites people to book is squarely inside them. Boards have been treating practice websites as business promotion for well over a decade.

In several states, in those words. New Jersey requires every advertisement to carry the licensee's name and the phrase “General Dentist”, or the specialty the Board actually permitted. North Carolina requires the dentist's name and their designation as a general dentist or specialist, stated prominently. Mississippi requires the note whenever the ad lists services, and there “family dentist” is an accepted substitute. Texas requires “General Dentist” or “General Dentistry” directly after the dentist's name. Minnesota requires the advertising to state that the services are being provided by a general dentist. The wording is not interchangeable between states, which is why the tool on this page prints your state's version rather than one generic line.

This is the single most common way a licensed dentist with nothing to hide gets a citation. Cosmetic dentistry is not a recognised dental specialty — neither is implant dentistry, aesthetic dentistry, sedation dentistry or restorative dentistry. Meanwhile “specialist”, “specialty”, “specializing” and, in Minnesota, even “limited to” are reserved words. Ohio prohibits terms implying a specialty for which no recognised specialty exists at all, while allowing terms that merely describe an area of practice. The safe construction is descriptive: “cosmetic and restorative dentistry” describes what you do; “cosmetic dentistry specialist” claims a credential that does not exist.

Doing the work is not the problem — advertising it as a specialty is. Most states let a general dentist perform and advertise services that fall in specialty areas, provided the ad discloses that they are a general dentist. Texas says so explicitly and adds that the services list has to be separate and clearly distinguishable from the general-dentist designation. Michigan requires the disclosure that the dentist is not certified as a specialist. Illinois requires a disclaimer stating that the dentist does not hold a licence in that specialty, and it applies to a real specialist advertising a second specialty too.

Less often than contractors, and Florida is the state where it clearly matters: all advertising in any medium must identify the Florida-licensed dentist who assumes total responsibility for it, and “identify” means the license number, or the name you commonly use together with the address and telephone number the Department has on file. Note the trap in the alternative — the address on file, not whichever address the site shows. Practices that moved and never updated the licence record fail that without knowing. Elsewhere the emphasis is on naming the dentist and their designation rather than the number.

The footer of every page is the simplest way to satisfy every version of the rule at once, and the per-dentist detail belongs on a real bio page. The reason is the same one that comes up in every advertising rule: the advertisement is whichever page the patient landed on, and most patients arrive from search on a service page, never the homepage. North Carolina makes it sharper by requiring the name and designation to be stated prominently. A sitewide footer plus one honest bio per dentist means you are never arguing about which page counted.

You can, and the conditions are the part people miss. New York permits testimonials and portrayals of professional practice provided the patient expressly authorises it in writing, the presentation discloses enough that nobody is misled about who they are, and reasonable disclaimers accompany any statement made or result achieved. New Jersey goes further and bars technical testimonials about the quality of a service outright, and requires written consent before using patient information at all. Separately from board rules, a patient's identity tied to their treatment is health information, so the consent you need is a real signed authorisation in your records, not a verbal yes.

Yes, and it is the requirement that fits a website worst. New Jersey requires copies of every advertisement to be kept for three years, with where and when it ran. New York requires an exact copy of each advertisement for one year after its last appearance. A website changes continuously and keeps no history by default, so the practical answer is to archive the pages that carry claims — a dated PDF or a screenshot each time you change the copy that makes a promise.

No, and this is worth being precise about. It means we did not read one against the primary source, so we are not going to state one. There are 51 dental boards and nearly all of them regulate advertising; we verified twelve and left two more out on purpose because the only copies we could find of their rules might be superseded. If your state is missing, ask your board what has to appear in your advertising. Everything else on this page still applies, because the questions are the same everywhere.

It is normally a complaint that becomes a citation with a civil penalty, not anything dramatic, and it usually reaches the board because a competitor or a disgruntled patient reported it rather than because an inspector was browsing. The part worth knowing is who wears it: North Carolina's rule makes the dentist whose services are advertised personally responsible for determining that the content is not contrary to state law or Board rules. Amounts and procedures vary by state, so confirm with your own board before assuming a figure you read online applies to you.

Practically, yes. Legally, no — and that gap is the reason this page exists. The licence is yours, the advertisement is yours, and in the states that say anything about responsibility they put it on the dentist. Agencies are generally very good at conversion and generally have no idea that Texas has a typography rule about the words “General Dentist”. Send them the block this page generates; it is faster than explaining the rule.

No. The rules on this page come from state DENTAL boards, and those are the boards whose rules we read and cited. The underlying idea is not unique to dentistry — most licensed professions restrict what their advertising may claim — but the specific rule, its wording and its penalty come from that profession's own board and they are not the same. This matters most for practices that straddle the line: if you also offer injectables or other medical aesthetics, that side of the business answers to your state medical board, not the dental board, and nothing on this page speaks to it.