California’s dental rulebook has been rewritten in stages over the past two years. Most of the change traces to one bill, SB 1453, the Dental Board of California’s 2024 “sunset” bill. A 2026 cleanup bill, AB 1760, adds more, and several smaller changes touch prescribing, fees and public records.
The Board is the licensing and enforcement agency for dentists and dental assistants in California. A legislative analysis prepared in April 2026 estimates it licenses about 112,000 dental professionals, including roughly 43,500 dentists, 46,000 registered dental assistants (RDAs) and 2,300 registered dental assistants in extended functions (RDAEFs). Dental hygienists are licensed by a separate agency, the Dental Hygiene Board of California.
SB 1453: the 2024 sunset bill
SB 1453 (Ashby, Chapter 483, Statutes of 2024) extended the Board’s existence and changed a range of requirements. Most of its provisions took effect January 1, 2025, and the dental-assisting changes followed on July 1, 2025.
Unlicensed dental assistants and infection control
Since January 1, 2025, an unlicensed dental assistant must complete a Board-approved eight-hour infection control course before performing basic supportive procedures that could expose them to infectious materials. The Board’s notice puts the obligation on the practice: “The employer of the unlicensed dental assistant is responsible for ensuring that they complete the IC course.” Assistants who can document a previously approved course do not need to retake it.
The Board has also said that some planned changes to course content are delayed. For now, infection control course providers must continue to follow the existing regulation, California Code of Regulations, title 16, section 1070.6.
Registered dental assistant licensure
From July 1, 2025, SB 1453 created three new ways to qualify for RDA licensure: a Certified Dental Assistant pathway, an Alternative Dental Assisting Program pathway, and a Preceptorship in Dental Assisting pathway. The Board’s alert on the changes also lists several new paperwork rules:
- RDA applicants must submit a completion certificate from a Board-approved pit and fissure sealant course with the exam and licensure application.
- Course certificates now expire for licensure and permit purposes. Dental Practice Act and infection control certificates must be dated within two years of the application. Coronal polishing, sealant and ultrasonic scaling certificates must be within five years, and radiation safety certificates within ten.
- Since January 1, 2025, certificates of completion must include specific items, among them the provider’s Board-issued approval number, the hours completed and a signature. The Board says it will not accept certificates that are missing them.
The expiration windows apply to people applying for RDA licensure and for orthodontic assistant and dental sedation assistant permits. They do not apply to unlicensed assistants.
Anesthesia and sedation permits
SB 1453 also revised the sedation and anesthesia permit framework. According to the Board’s summary, dentists applying for a general anesthesia permit must maintain current Advanced Cardiac Life Support certification. The law also makes clear that the dentist who administers or orders deep sedation, general anesthesia or moderate sedation must be physically present in the facility while the patient is sedated. Pediatric minimal sedation permit holders need at least seven hours of related continuing education to renew. The option of qualifying for an oral conscious sedation certificate for adults by documenting ten cases was eliminated.
AB 1760: a new radiation safety course
AB 1760 (Arambula, Chapter 167, Statutes of 2026) was sponsored by the Board as an omnibus cleanup of the Dental Practice Act. Its most immediate effect is on radiation safety training. According to the Board’s alert, the law creates a new radiation safety course, allows every full-mouth intraoral radiograph series in the course to be completed digitally, and requires distance-learning courses to explain their technology to students and help them participate.
Current course providers are not grandfathered. To keep offering the course after January 1, 2028, they must apply for approval under the new standard. The Board posted the application in October 2026 and says no applications will be approved before January 1, 2027. The Board also says RDA programs may not use the new course inside a Board-approved RDA program, and that radiation instruction there continues under the existing regulations.
The Assembly Appropriations Committee’s analysis of the bill as introduced lists other provisions. Among them: a dental license applicant who fails a section of a required exam three times would have to retake the whole exam, the Licensure by Credential pathway would change, and the Board would gain authority to audit infection control and radiation safety courses. Practices with candidates in the licensure pipeline should check the chaptered text for the final version. The same analysis notes the Board’s next sunset review is in 2028.
Prescribing and CURES
Two changes affect dentists who prescribe controlled substances. The CURES fee, charged at renewal to licensees authorized to prescribe Schedule II through V drugs, rose from $9 to $15 a year for licenses expiring on or after July 1, 2025. Because renewal is every two years, the Board says most licensees will see a $30 charge. Separately, under AB 82, effective January 1, 2026, providers may no longer report prescriptions or dispensing of testosterone or mifepristone to CURES. The Board says existing records of those drugs are to be removed by January 1, 2027.
Records, fees and fraud
The Board is required by law to post every licensee’s address of record online. A post office box or other alternate address may be used instead of a home address. Dentists must report a change of address of record within 30 days, and the Board warns that failing to do so risks nonrenewal.
The Board has issued repeated fraud alerts, most recently in October 2026, about callers and emails impersonating its staff. Its guidance is direct: Board staff will never demand payment by phone.
Ownership deals: SB 351
One more 2025 law matters to owners considering outside investment. SB 351, signed October 6, 2025 and effective January 1, 2026, bars private equity groups and hedge funds involved with physician or dental practices in California from interfering with dentists’ professional judgment. A legal analysis by Epstein Becker Green lists the decisions covered, among them diagnostic testing, referrals, patient volume and hours, coding and billing, and equipment selection. The law also voids related noncompete and nondisparagement clauses in those contracts. The Attorney General enforces it.
What to do now
Owners can confirm every assistant’s infection control certificate, check that RDA candidates’ certificates fall within the new expiration windows, and review the address of record the Board will publish. Radiation safety course providers have until January 1, 2028, but the Board urges early applications.
Sources
- Dental Board of California, homepage News and Alerts (new laws effective 2025 and 2026)
- Dental Board of California, Alert: New Application Requirements for Registered Dental Assistants Established by SB 1453 (effective July 1, 2025)
- Dental Board of California, Alert: SB 1453 Changes to Anesthesia and Sedation Permits (effective January 1, 2025)
- Dental Board of California, Alert: AB 1760 Establishes a New Radiation Safety Course
- Assembly Committee on Appropriations, analysis of AB 1760 (hearing date April 15, 2026)
- Dental Board of California, Notice of CURES Fee Increase
- California Legislative Information, AB 82 bill text
- Dental Board of California, Notice of Public Posting of Addresses of Record
- Epstein Becker Green, “California Governor Signs SB 351 Strengthening the State’s Corporate Practice of Medicine Doctrine”
