One Hour, Every First Wednesday
Dentist Hour is the Philippine Dental Association's environmental hour. From 12:00 noon to 1:00 PM on the first Wednesday of the month, member clinics switch off the lights, turn off or raise the air-conditioning to 25 degrees, and unplug what does not need to run. The 10th Dentist Hour fell on Wednesday, March 4, 2026, and the PDA San Pablo City Chapter took part.
The program sits under Pilipinong Dentista Aaksyon Para Sa Kalikasan, or PDA-PSK, the association's environmental arm, and it is part of the wider Ecodentistry effort that asks dental practices to cut their carbon footprint. The March edition carried a graduation theme, "March to Graduation: Shine Bright, Save the Earth."
How a Chapter Takes Part
The mechanics are simple and built for proof. Members download a timestamp camera app, photograph their darkened clinics during the hour, and post the photos with the campaign hashtags so the chapter's participation is counted. The San Pablo City Chapter posted its timestamped clinic photos that afternoon, tagged #pdaecodentistry2025 and #dentisthour. We have chosen not to republish those photos here, since they show the inside of a member's private clinic with its address.
Why It Matters to a Clinic
A dental clinic is a small building with a large electrical bill: a compressor, a suction motor, an autoclave, an X-ray unit, operatory lights and the air-conditioning that runs all day. One hour off a month changes little on its own. The point of Dentist Hour is the habit it builds, and the audit it prompts: which of these draws power all day and does not need to?
Two of the easiest wins are in the chair itself. Modern dental units draw far less at idle than the units they replace, and LED operatory lights use a fraction of the power of the halogen lamps they succeeded, while running cooler, which in turn eases the air-conditioning. If your unit is more than a decade old, a Dentist Hour audit is a fair moment to check what it costs to keep running.
The chapter's environmental work continued from the coconut planting it joined in August 2025. Read that story.
Source: PDA San Pablo City Chapter Official.