Meet Our Board of Directors
Nan Portmann, RDH
President
Nan has been working in clinical hygiene since graduating with high honors in 2009. Periodontics and teaching are her passions which lead her to found her own dental education company offering innovative and advanced professional development continuing education programs. Nan leads two dynamic hygiene study club’s, actively trains dental endoscopy implementation and advocates for integrated medical/dental collaboration within her community. Nan believes hygienists possess a specialized and valuable skill set to profoundly transform healthcare advancement with opportunities to become intrinsically involved in prevention protocols and implementation within independent and non-traditional settings.
Sarah Clark, RDH, IPDH
Secretary
Sarah's passion for advocacy lead her to volunteer for the Maine Dental Hygienists’ Association, and is their current President. Sarah’s passions include helping the dental community advance current practice methods, advocating for programs which allow dental hygienists to practice independently or in non-traditional settings, and working towards career advancement.
Carla L Watts RDH, BS
Treasurer
Carla started out in Dentistry as a CDA and pivoted to dental hygiene in 1990. During her 30 years as an RDH she has observed dentistry “speculate” that there is an oral systemic link to the research proving this link. She has been and continues to be an advocate both within and outside the dental arena to educate on the importance of connecting the medical and dental field. Carla is passionate about incorporating a real-world solution/process for primary care medical facilities to incorporate a proactive vs reactive medical/dental partnership.
Charo Earle, RDH, BS, MSA
Charo has been in the dental industry since 1999 and is a Senior Clinical Service Manager in Michigan. Charo enjoys her role by partnering with Operations and Clinical Strategy Leaders to train, develop, and lead hygiene teams to achieve personal and professional goals, while delivering comprehensive patient care. She has always been passionate about educating, volunteering, and giving back to others. Her passion was ignited in hygiene school while doing rounds in senior nursing centers where dental care was almost non-existent, and working in highly state funded practices, where dental IQ and prevention were low. Charo truly enjoys helping people and being of service to those in need. She knows what she was called to do as she states– “Helping other People is my Passion & my Purpose!”
Karen Thomas, MSc, CNS, LN, LDN, BS, RDH, FDN-P, CHHC
Karen is the CEO and Founder of Holistic Digestive Solutions and sits on the board of the North Carolina Board of Dietetics/Nutrition. She’s a Licensed Nutritionist, Supervisor for the North Carolina Board of Nutrition Specialists, a Certified Biological Dental Hygienist, a Certified Functional Diagnostic Nutrition® Practitioner, Certified Integrative Nutrition® Health Coach, a motivational speaker, educator, and award-winning author of Overwhelmed & Undernourished: Use Food as Medicine and Turn Your Life Around, and the 2020 Recipient of the Sunstar/RDH Award of Distinction. She also holds a Master’s of Science in Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine.
She currently works with private clients in addition to working with physicians who seek her counsel on finding the root causes of mysterious autoimmune diseases for their own patients. Karen uses functional medicine laboratory testing to accomplish this. She then designs bio-individual protocols to aid in reversing chronic health diseases.
LaNeidra Williams, MBA, BS, RDH
LaNeidra is a Mississippi native who has worked in the dental hygiene industry for 13 years. She has received her Bachelors of Dental Hygiene from the University of Mississippi Medical Center and her Masters of Business Administration with a Healthcare Administration Concentration from Belhaven University. LaNeidra has worked in the public health sector for over 5 years. She has worked on the medical-dental integration workforce with the Mississippi State Department of Health - Office of Oral Health as a Regional Oral Health Consultant and created diabetes oral health education on the Mississippi State Department of Health Diabetes Board.
LaNeidra is currently employed with TMF Health Quality Institute as a Healthcare Quality Improvement Specialist focusing on oral care quality improvement in the long term care setting. She is also the creator of The Social ExperiMINT, a social media and event management company solely for the dental professional. She is a current member of the National Association of Healthcare Quality, Mississippi Oral Health Community Alliance, Mississippi Tobacco Free Coalition and Diabetes Coalition of Mississippi.
Jamie Freitag-Dooley, RDH, BIS, CLBC
Founder & Executive Director
Non-voting board member
Cell for texting: 616-375-0804
Jamie is a certified life and business coach, program developer, thought leader, and change agent. She worked 15 years full time as a clinical hygienist before going back to school for healthcare & nonprofit management. After spending 8 years in dental public health (working both clinically and administratively), and 3 years helping hygienists expand beyond traditional settings in her coaching business, she started our organization and dedicated herself to integration as the future of our profession. Her goal is to change when and how oral health is discussed in the primary care setting and to introduce new programs and systems to the medical model which include hygienists as Oral Systemic Educators and prevention specialists.
View our list of Founding Members who made our initial development possible
