How SmileShop knows what it knows

Sources & Review Board

SmileShop's reference content is informed by peer-reviewed dental literature, government health authorities, and (over time) named licensed dental clinicians. We tell you exactly where every claim comes from — see our Editorial Standards for the full methodology.

Government health authorities

U.S. federal agencies that publish public-domain oral health research, prevention guidance, and regulatory information.

NIDCR — National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research

Primary U.S. federal research body on oral, dental, and craniofacial health. Public domain content.

CDC — Division of Oral Health

Population-level oral health data, prevention guidance, surveillance reports. Public domain.

MedlinePlus — National Library of Medicine

Patient-facing reference on dental conditions and procedures. Public domain.

FDA — Dental Devices

Regulatory guidance for whitening products, implants, aligners, dental materials. Public domain.

Peer-reviewed open-access journals

Every link below opens free, full-text peer-reviewed dental research — no paywall, no signup. These are the sources our clinical reference content draws from. Where we republish an individual article, full attribution and license are shown on that article.

PubMed Central — Open Access dental research

Free full-text dental research from the U.S. National Library of Medicine. Every article on this page is free to read — no signup, no paywall.

BMC Oral Health — Articles

Peer-reviewed open-access dental journal (CC-BY license). Click any article — full text is free.

PLOS ONE — Dental research

Open-access multidisciplinary journal (CC-BY). Search results pre-filtered to dental research — every result is free to read in full.

Cochrane Oral Health — Plain-language summaries

Free plain-language summaries of Cochrane systematic reviews on dental treatments — gold-standard evidence syntheses.

Industry & economic references

Licensed industry datasets used to build our pricing baselines.

ADA — American Dental Association

CDT code reference (licensed). Survey of dental fees (cited).

BLS — Bureau of Labor Statistics

Consumer Price Index for dental services — used to track year-over-year pricing trends.

Dental clinician contributors

Licensed dentists and dental hygienists who contribute named, credentialed content to SmileShop. Verified by license check before publication.

Our clinician review board is open for applications.

SmileShop is actively recruiting licensed dentists (DDS/DMD) and registered dental hygienists (RDH) as named reviewers. Until we onboard our first verified clinicians, our reference content cites peer-reviewed open-access literature and government health authorities directly — see above.

Apply to join the review board

Want to dig deeper?

Our full editorial methodology — how we source, review, and update content; how we handle advertiser independence; and how to report an error — is on the standards page.

Read our Editorial Standards