Dr. Kirk Preston president@cda-adc.ca The Case for Rest Summer is often the time of year when dentists take a well-deserved vacation. We spend time with family, enjoy the outdoors, travel or simply slow down for a few days or weeks. I hope each of you gets an opportunity to rest. I would also encourage you to think about the concept of rest a little differently. It doesn’t have to be something we only reserve for summer vacations. It can be something we intentionally build into our professional lives throughout our careers. The demands of our profession are manifold. Each day, we balance patient care, complex clinical decisions, business responsibilities, staffing challenges, administrative work and the physical demands of practising dentistry. Dentists often have careers that span 40 years; it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Taking care of our physical and mental well-being is essential if we want to sustain healthy, fulfilling careers for decades to come. Like many dentists, I spent the early part of my career believing that success meant working as much as possible. For years I worked six days a week, with hours extending into the evenings and Saturday mornings. I genuinely believed that if I wasn’t there, the practice would suffer. I worried that my patients wouldn’t receive the service they deserved, my staff would lose paid hours and everything would begin to unravel. Looking back, I realize how this mindset persists among many of my colleagues. We care deeply about our patients and our teams, and we often feel personally responsible for keeping everything running smoothly. That perspective began to change when I completed my MBA. The program required me to spend one week away from my practice every five weeks, for the two-year duration of the program. Initially, I was convinced that my practice would suffer. Instead, something unexpected happened. It made little to no difference to the practice financially and my production actually increased. More importantly, I came back to work after these week-long study breaks with more energy, sharper focus and a better attitude. I wasn’t tired or irritable. My team noticed the difference, and so did I. Knowing that I had regular time away gave me something to look forward to, and when I returned, I was fully present for my patients and my team. That experience taught me something that I wish I had learned much earlier in my career: working more hours doesn’t make us more effective. Sometimes the opposite is true. Occupational health researchers Sabine Sonnentag and Charlotte Fritz have shown that regularly disconnecting from work allows us to recover from the mental and emotional demands of our jobs.1 Their research found that people who are able to “switch off” from work have less burnout and are more engaged and effective when they are working. More recent studies have reached similar conclusions: recovery from work isn’t simply good for our health, it also supports sustained job performance and helps us maintain the energy and focus that our professions demand. Think of it this way: If the benefits of rest could be put into a pill, everyone would take it. If you’re feeling overwhelmed or finding it difficult to recharge, you don’t have to navigate those challenges alone. The Working Mind is an evidence-based program developed with CDA and the Mental Health Commission of Canada to help dental professionals build healthier workplaces and recognize the signs of stress in themselves and others. Provincial and territorial dental associations, along with other organizations and societies, can sponsor the program for dentists and their teams. CDSPI’s Members’ Assistance Program (MAP) also provides confidential support for dentists, dental teams, students and their families, offering resources for everything from stress and burnout to work-life balance, counselling, financial and legal advice. Taking care of yourself should not be seen as stepping away from your responsibilities. It’s one of the best ways to ensure that you can continue meeting your responsibilities for years to come. From the President 1. Sonnentag S, Fritz C. Recovery from job stress: The stressor-detachment model as an integrative framework. Journal of Organizational Behavior. 2015:36(S1);S72–S103. https://doi.org/10.1002/job.1924 7 Issue 4 | 2026 | CDA at Work
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