How to Verify a Dental License in Louisiana Before You Hire

Dentists and dental hygienists in Louisiana are licensed by the Louisiana State Board of Dentistry, whose online License Verification page lets anyone search by license number or name.

Dental assistants are the exception — the board says it does not regulate them, though it issues "certificate confirmations" to Expanded Duty Dental Assistants (EDDAs).

That split decides where you look for each hire:

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Start with how to verify a dental license for the general workflow; the Louisiana specifics are below.

Search by license number or name on the board's License Verification page, which the board states is considered primary source verification of current licensure — the record to trust, not a photocopy of a certificate.

Each dentist (D) result lists the license number, name, status, whether there is disciplinary action, the issue date and the expiration date.

Read the status, not just the name match, and note the expiration date.

If the search turns up nothing, check the spelling first — retired or revoked licenses, and license information not found in the search, are verified by contacting the board office directly at 225-219-7330.

Sedation is a separate question from the license.

The board issues dentists personal nitrous oxide permits and personal and office permits for moderate sedation and general anesthesia, and it no longer requires office nitrous permits — a dentist with a personal nitrous permit may administer nitrous in any dental office in Louisiana.

Those permits are not search result columns: ask the candidate for the permit and confirm it with the board before you schedule sedation cases.

Earning the license is a different topic — see our guide to dentist licensure requirements in Louisiana.

Hygienists come back from the same search: each hygienist (H) result shows the same columns as a dentist's, so confirm the license is active and note the expiration the same way.

The permit question is where Louisiana hygienists differ from their license: a Louisiana hygienist needs separate board permits to administer nitrous oxide or local anesthesia, and neither permit is a column in the online search.

If your schedule counts on a hygienist covering patients with nitrous or local anesthetic, ask for the permit and confirm it with the board rather than assuming it rides along with the license.

What the permits take to earn: our guide to dental hygienist requirements in Louisiana.

Start with the board's own framing: it says it does not regulate dental assistants, but it issues certificate confirmations for Expanded Duty Dental Assistants (EDDAs) — and the confirmations are where the verification work is.

Under Louisiana board rule LAC 46:XXXIII §504, a dental assistant may not perform expanded duties until registered with the board and issued an EDDA certificate confirmation, which requires an approved EDDA course, current BLS and an approved radiology course. (§501.C also exempts assistants who worked before July 30, 1992 for certain listed duties — ask the board if that could apply.)

Board rules also let an assistant take and develop dental radiographs under the employing dentist's direct on-premises supervision, with a board-approved X-ray function and safety course required for the EDDA confirmation.

Our read of the rules found no separate radiography certificate for non-EDDA assistants — confirm that reading with the board if the x-ray question decides a hire.

Check the confirmation's currency, not just its existence: Louisiana EDDA certificate confirmations are reconfirmed every two years and become inactive if the reconfirmation fee is not paid by December 31.

The display rule helps you — every EDDA must display the certificate confirmation where their patients can see it.

Ask to see it, check the reconfirmation, and treat the board as the backstop when the certificate doesn't answer your questions.

The full scope picture is in our guide to dental assistant requirements in Louisiana.

When a search result shows disciplinary action, the board's page links to a PDF of the action on file — read it, because the flag alone doesn't say whether the matter was a reprimand or a suspension.

Discipline also surfaces at the National Practitioner Data Bank: state dental boards must report any action based on professional competence or conduct that revokes, suspends or restricts a dentist's license, censures, reprimands or places a dentist on probation, or accepts a license surrender — and dental boards count as NPDB reporters.

Querying the NPDB is limited to eligible entities, so the practical route is the candidate's self-query, which the practitioner may share with whomever they choose.

Our guide to NPDB queries covers who can query and how.

The Louisiana search covers Louisiana's records.

If your candidate has practiced in another state, verify that license with the issuing state's board — our research found no single national dental license lookup.

And run the rest of your screening alongside the license check, OIG exclusion checks included: someone excluded by HHS-OIG can receive no payment from federal health care programs for items or services they furnish, order or prescribe, and those programs include Medicaid and CHIP.

Save what you saw, the day you saw it: screenshot or print each search result — license number, status, disciplinary-action column, issue date, expiration date — and file it with the hire's paperwork.

If a result showed discipline, save the PDF the board links to as well.

A dated copy beats a recollection later.

Calendar what expires: re-run each search around the expiration dates you recorded, and again before someone takes on a duty needing a separate credential — dentist sedation or nitrous, hygiene nitrous or local anesthesia, assistant expanded duties.

When you need the board's own formal record rather than a screenshot, it provides written license certifications bearing its seal for $25.00 per certification.

Once screening is clear, the contract stage has its own limits: our guide to non-competes in Louisiana covers what a practice there can and cannot put in one.