About Dr Caitlin Hurley

B App Sci (Sp Path), B Dent (Hons), Dip Clin Hyp, D Clin Dent (Paeds), MRACDS (PDS, Paeds)

Specialist Paediatric Dentist

Dr Caitlin is a specialist paediatric dentist who brings her unique professional and personal experiences into the dental clinic to deliver exceptional dental care to children in a genuinely positive environment. 

Caitlin grew up in Sydney, and as the second youngest of five daughters her communication and team-work skills were being developed from a young age. Her mother, also a dentist, was genuinely surprised to have one of her daughters pursue the same career, although still wonders why anyone would choose a paediatric specialty (the adage of don’t work with children or animals was quoted!).

Caitlin first trained as a speech pathologist before completing her dentistry degree with honours at the University of Sydney. Her natural skill and passion for the profession was recognised early with multiple awards including The University of Sydney Academic Merit Prize (2009) and The Martin Halas Prize I (2010), for the highest performing student based on marks and for the highest clinical grade respectively.

Over more than a decade of practice in general dentistry, Caitlin and her husband - both in the thick of their medical training – lived as self-confessed nomads, working across regional and metropolitan areas in New South Wales, Tasmania and Western Australia. Along the way Caitlin completed a Diploma of Clinical Hypnosis, which she draws on every day to help anxious children feel calm, safe, and confident in the dental chair.

With three young children and a pandemic shutting down life as we knew it, Caitlin completed her Doctor of Clinical Dentistry in Paediatric Dentistry at the University of Western Australia. During this time, she worked as a registrar at the Oral Health Centre of Western Australia and at Perth Children’s Hospital, gaining invaluable experience in the management of children with complex behavioural and medical needs as well as dental traumas referred from all over Western Australia to the busy emergency department.

Caitlin’s academic work continued to be recognised through her post-graduate training with award of the Louise Brearley-Messer Postgraduate Essay Prize, and the Morita Award for best poster presentation at the International Association of Paediatric Dentistry Congress in The Netherlands. She remains deeply committed to lifelong learning and to giving back to her profession – speaking at conferences, teaching to new graduate dentists, and facilitating the Society of Paediatric Anaesthesia Australia and New Zealand (SPANZA) EPIC program, teaching clinicians how to ease children’s anxiety around medical and dental procedures.

After taking a seven-month family holiday of a lifetime, affectionately known as “The Big Trip”, covering 33,000kms and living out of a camper trailer named Tiffany (yes, she matches the jewellery boxes!) her family relocated and settled on the Sunshine Coast. Caitlin has now established Kid’s Smile Lab, her own specialist dental practice where all her training and experience is being used to create a place where every child feels genuinely welcome, and families are partnered with so they can be confident in the tailored and expert care being delivered.

When not at Kids’ Smile Lab you’ll usually find Caitlin outdoors – hiking, camping, sailing, running parkrun with her kids, or on surf patrol at Kawana Beach over the summer. Her creative interests include an unhealthy obsession with sewing book week costumes and she will more than happily overshare the growing photo album or take tips in August each year!

Caitlin is looking forward to meeting you and your family at Kids’ Smile Lab.