Seminar - 60 Minutes

Using Extramural Rotations to Prepare Dental School Graduates to Work with Underserved Populations of Children

Presenter(s)

• PS

  Patrick Smith, DMD, MPH

  Clinical Assistant Professor
  Univeristy of Illinois, Chicago College of Dentistry
• 

  Bob Egan, MPA

  Senior Program Officer
  Illinois Children's Healthcare Foundation

The purpose is to describe how the Illinois Children’s Healthcare Foundation partnered with Southern Illinois University (SIU) School of Dental Medicine and University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) College of Dentistry to address the critical issue of low numbers of dentists serving low-income children in the state of Illinois. The presentation will include background on the Foundation’s mission related to children’s oral health, a description of curricular enhancements implemented at both schools to prepare future dentists to work with children and in public health settings, and key findings from a seven year evaluation of this project. Each college implemented a unique approach to the curricular enhancements, but both used service learning to increase students’ engagement with children in community-based settings. Additionally, UIC will provide an update of their current service-learning curriculum, which has evolved as a result of their participation in this initiative.

 

Learning Objectives:

• Describe a statewide foundation’s strategies to improve the oral health status of children within the state.
• Describe an oral health workforce development strategy to increase access for underserved children and evaluation findings.
• Summarize one participating dental school’s predoctoral pediatric dentistry curriculum changes that resulted from this initiative.