An award-winning dental hygienist has scooped a business prize as employer of the year.
Alison Thompson, who won the Dental Hygiene & Therapy in 2011 for her oral health promotion and excellence in preventive dentistry, won the latest title at the NatWest Venus Awards Brighton and Sussex.
The awards were founded by Tara Howard, the managing director of The Langtry Manor Hotel in Bournemouth and, this year, the Venus Awards were extended, rewarding hundreds more business women across Brighton, Bristol and Birmingham.
Alison, who owns and runs The Dental Barn in Upper Dicker in Hailsham, east Sussex, was rewarded for being ‘dedicated to helping patients maintain healthy gums and fresh breath’.
She said: ‘We opened as a new practice in September 2010 and we’re determined to make a vision of different dentistry.
‘The practice is a barn conversion on a farm and we even have our own duck pond where the kids can come and feed the ducks. I feel it’s really great when someone comes to our practice and says: “I love it here, it’s not like going to the dentist”.
‘I was one of the first hygienists in the UK to open her own practice. We’re all a very close team of five people, and I just couldn’t do without them. I value them all as an individual but also part of my dental family. I asked the team to sum up working with me and they said: “There is never a dull moment… you are professional, fair, fun and understanding, everybody’s opinion counts and we never stop laughing. They said I was everything they wanted in a boss.’
