LT Demario Walls, MDH, RDH

LT Demario Walls, MDH, RDH, a native of Memphis, completed Dental Hygiene school at Concorde Career College. He understood the importance of education beyond an entry-level degree. In 2014, he received a Bachelor of Science in Dental Hygiene from University of Mississippi, and, in 2017, LT Walls earned a Master of Dental Hygiene from UTHSC.

Soon after receiving his dental hygiene license, LT Walls began clinical work in private practice. However, he always felt like public health was his life’s work. He was commissioned in the United States Public Health Service in 2016, where his first duty station was at a federal prison in Memphis. He has been on countless deployments, nationally and internationally, where he has provided dental hygiene services to underserved communities. LT Walls also presented dental hygiene lectures aboard the USNS Comfort to US Navy dentists and hygienists while traveling abroad. He is now a Regulatory Officer with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, protecting the public by ensuring the safety and efficacy of pharmaceutical drugs.

LT Walls holds a membership with Commissioned Officers Association, Public Health Service Ensemble, PHS Dental Hygienist Professional Association Group, and American Dental Hygienist Association. He serves as the Treasurer for the Memphis Dental Hygienists’ Association and has now been appointed as the Treasurer for the Tennessee Dental Hygienists’ Association.

LT Walls has been awarded the Global Response Service Award and Global Health Campaign Medal for his work internationally in dentistry.

LT Walls has always followed this quote by the former US Surgeon General C. Everett Koop, “Health care is vital to all of us some of the time, but public health is vital to all of us all of the time.”