Seeing is Believing: How Dental Endoscopy is Revolutionizing Hygiene Treatment
When Katie Benavides watched dental hygienists cleaning her teeth as a child, she was fascinated by the scaling instruments working on her "baby teeth." That early curiosity sparked a career path that would eventually lead her to become a pioneer in dental endoscopy—a technology that allows hygienists to literally see below the gumline during treatment.
In a recent interview on The Dental Handoff podcast with Dr. Kelly Tanner, Benavides shared her journey from dental assistant to hygienist to co-founder of PerioPrecise, a company making dental endoscopy more accessible to practices nationwide.
Finding Her Path In Dental Hygiene
Benavides' dental journey began unexpectedly at a party store where she worked at age 15. A coworker left to become a dental lab runner, and when that position opened up, Benavides jumped at the opportunity. While delivering cases to offices, she was approached by a dental team looking for an assistant.
"They just trained me off the street on how to do dental assisting," she recalls. This hands-on introduction provided valuable experience before entering hygiene school—helping her develop comfort with patients and understand clinical flow.
After graduating hygiene school at just 21, Benavides spent her first seven years in a perio-driven practice that allowed her to develop strong skills in periodontal diagnosis and treatment. However, she eventually reached a point where she wanted more advanced opportunities.
"I wanted to continue on with more than just the day-to-day clinical hygiene," she explains.
Discovering Dental Endoscopy
The turning point came when Benavides remembered using a perioscope during her hygiene school rotation at a periodontal office. The device, a tiny camera that allows clinicians to see below the gumline, had fascinated her, but learning to use one required either finding an office with the technology or purchasing it independently.
When accepting a position at a new practice, Benavides negotiated the purchase of an endoscope as part of her employment. After four months of gentle persistence ("Hey doc, this is what was promised, let's get that endoscope"), the doctor invested in the technology.
The practice, led by an accredited cosmetic dentist, initially wanted the endoscope primarily for cement removal after crown cementation to ensure pristine gingiva. However, Benavides had her sights set on its periodontal applications.
"My motive was perio," she notes, explaining how using the device frequently for cement removal helped her build skills that transferred to periodontal treatment.
Enhancing Treatment With Vision
Perhaps the most significant advantage of dental endoscopy is the ability to confirm complete calculus removal—something hygienists have traditionally had to evaluate through tactile sensation alone.
When asked about the device's role in treatment planning, Benavides explains: "In our practice, we would put it in all of the SRP cases. Anybody who was diagnosed with SRPs would have the option to choose to have it done endoscopically or not."
Her team eventually expanded its use to patients with gingivitis who had heavy, tenacious calculus without bone loss. "We find with the endoscope that we can remove that tenacious calculus easily without a problem, ensuring that this patient gets full calc removal so that they can get actual gingival healing without any question."
This approach often prevented escalation to scaling and root planing by ensuring thorough initial treatment—a win for both patients and practitioners.
Technology Evolution
While dental endoscopy has existed for approximately 20 years, the technology has evolved significantly. The original Perioscopy system provided a circular "tunnel view" that many clinicians found difficult to interpret without training.
The newer PerioView system offers dramatically improved clarity, "like a 4K television versus a 90s television," according to Benavides. This enhancement allows even untrained clinicians to distinguish tooth structure from calculus and identify root fractures.
PerioView also adds recording capabilities and a full-screen medical-grade computer display, eliminating the need for assistants to record procedures for patient education. "With PerioView, I just hit record...and the patients are so validated after seeing their own video," Benavides explains. "They just can't believe what they're seeing...and there's all the feels."
This visual confirmation also reduces reliance on post-operative radiographs to verify calculus removal, though many practices still take them to document the improvement.
From Practitioner To Pioneer
Performing endoscopic procedures two to three times weekly in her practice, Benavides found herself thinking: "This is all I want to do...I don't understand why it's only here in my practice. We need to figure out how we can get this out to the masses."
A chance connection through a Dentsply Sirona representative introduced Benavides to Marvalyn Navarro, another hygienist passionate about endoscopy. After meeting for coffee, the two discovered they shared the same vision for expanding access to the technology.
"Marvalyn and I were on the same level of passion. I had never met anybody like that before who cared so much about endoscopy and wanted the masses to know about it and learn about it," Benavides recalls. The connection was so strong that they formed an LLC within a week of meeting, despite their husbands' initial skepticism.
Their company, PerioPrecise, now offers:
Clinical services in Las Vegas where they are licensed
Education for practitioners interested in the technology
Training for those implementing endoscopes
Coaching for hygiene departments developing endoscopy programs
Following Your Passion
For dental professionals considering new paths, Benavides offers straightforward advice: "Just follow your dreams. If it's as simple as staying in the clinic, just follow your dream in the clinic and find something that excites you and you're passionate about on that scale. If it's on a grand scale, just follow that path and make sure that you're doing what you love."
Her own journey demonstrates how curiosity, persistence, and collaboration can transform not only individual careers but potentially an entire aspect of dental care. By bringing enhanced visibility to a traditionally "blind" procedure, Benavides and her partner are helping hygienists provide more thorough care while giving patients visual confirmation of their treatment's effectiveness.
When describing how she and Navarro approach their business, Benavides reveals their mindset: "We've kind of already blocked out any possibility of failure...if you want to do something of this sort, you really just have to go all in with positivity and just tell yourself you're not going to fail.”
Watch the full episode: https://youtu.be/1uIR-aIZiK8
Keywords: periodontal care, dental visualization, dental hygiene career, dental technology, subgingival calculus, scaling and root planing, dental education, dental hygiene business, The Dental Handoff podcast, preventive periodontal care, dental hygiene specialization