Written by
Amaya Johnson
The dental staffing shortage is not a new problem. Practices across the country have spent years navigating last-minute cancellations, schedule gaps, and the quiet revenue bleed that comes with an open chair. For dental professionals, the same market pressure has created real questions about where to work, what flexibility looks like, and who actually has their back. GoTu was built to answer both sides of that problem. This partnership makes that answer reach further.
GoTu is excited to announce a strategic partnership with Henry Schein, Inc. (Nasdaq: HSIC), the world’s largest provider of health care solutions to office-based dental and medical practitioners. Together, the two companies will work to bring GoTu’s workforce technology to more dental practices across the country, through one of dentistry’s most trusted and far-reaching networks.
GoTu’s third annual State of Work survey, developed in collaboration with the American Dental Hygienists’ Association, makes the workforce picture clear. Staffing gaps remain one of the most significant operational challenges facing dental practices today, and their impact extends well beyond scheduling headaches. Practices that can’t staff reliably lose productivity, lose revenue, and in some cases lose patients.
The numbers behind the shortage are consistent year over year. The US needs nearly 10,000 additional dental professionals to stabilize the workforce. California alone has more than 500 dental professional shortage areas. These are not temporary fluctuations. They reflect structural gaps between the supply of qualified dental talent and the demand practices have for reliable, vetted coverage.
GoTu was founded in 2019 specifically to address this crisis, and the platform has scaled to more than 200,000 dental professionals and 45,000 dental offices across all 50 states. To date, GoTu has filled more than 1,000,000 shifts nationwide.
What the Henry Schein Partnership Means for Dental Practices
Henry Schein operates through a network of trusted advisors who work directly with dental practices on everything from supplies to technology to operational consulting. That trusted advisor model is exactly what makes this partnership meaningful for offices.
Practices that already work with Henry Schein will now have easier access to GoTu’s workforce tools as part of their broader practice support ecosystem. That means faster paths to finding qualified hygienists, dental assistants, and associate dentists for both short-term coverage and permanent placement needs, without having to source those solutions separately.
For offices that have been managing staffing gaps reactively, this partnership makes a proactive approach more accessible. GoTu’s platform lets offices post a shift and connect with verified dental professionals quickly, with every professional rated and reviewed after each booking. The process is designed to reduce the friction that has historically made reactive staffing so costly, in time, in revenue, and in care continuity.
What This Means for Dental Professionals
The benefits of this partnership extend to the professionals on GoTu as well. As more practices enter the GoTu network through this collaboration, the volume and variety of available shifts grows with them. For hygienists, dental assistants, and associate dentists using GoTu to build flexible careers, a larger office network means more opportunities to work where and when they choose.
GoTu has paid out over $100 million to dental professionals on the platform. That number reflects a community of 200,000+ professionals who have already chosen a different way to work. This partnership adds more offices to that network, which means more options, more earning potential, and more proof that flexible dental work is here to stay.
Solving the dental staffing shortage requires more than a marketplace. It requires trusted partners, shared reach, and a genuine commitment to the practices and professionals who keep dentistry running. That is what this partnership is built on.
