The Year in Review:

Students come to UNLV eager to learn, with the goal of becoming a great dentist, honest, caring and sympathetic to those in need. Reviewing applications for admission shows the following; love of our integrated curriculum, our evidenced based approach to delivery of care, our general practice emphasis, our community work and volunteerism, and our high–tech, new facility. After four years students can create any anatomy in wax, know that cascades are more than waterfalls, assess their work in 0.10mm increments and miniscule angles, visualize techniques and processes, apply the Krebs cycle, and give presentations or "coffee table" discussions of types of genetic disorders, and present cariology concepts in diverse media. From physiology and pharmacology to hand control and data review, students can restore teeth, smiles and yes, sometimes lives. They have learned all phases of normal and variant human anatomy, from cellular to macro levels. They have truly grown into doctors of the head and neck, with an emphasis in overall health.

But, what is next? Do dentists just continue with what has been taught? Is it more of the same for the next 40 years? We at UNLV SDM think not. We think that these new graduates will be pivotal in dentistry, and they will require the use of all their training and skills throughout their dental practice life. We believe they will utilize complex medical procedures to literally re–grow teeth, and make ethical decisions regarding when those procedures are safe and warranted. This will require sterility techniques at the level of hospital surgery, and inoculation to all types of dental disease will become a reality in their lifetime. They will truly become generalized medical physicians of the head and neck. Consider completion of the genome map. This has allowed advances in the isolation of problematic genetic coding. Over limited time dentistry will be able to isolate genes which predispose individuals to contract periodontal disease and caries, instituting early preventative techniques. Genetic engineering continues to develop microbial splicing, effectively preventing gene defects and allowing for tissue regeneration.

What about harvesting stem cells? Undifferentiated stem cells can mature into alveolar or cortical bone, soft tissues, and missing or unhealthy tooth structure, from pulpal tissue to enamel tissue. We believe our graduate doctors will be re–growing cavitated teeth. It will be exciting to re–grow and reimplant a missing tooth, instead of restoring or implanting missing structures with man–made options.

Equipment will progress as well. Lasers will expand into full–service usage in dentistry–excimer lasers already cut without heat; the cost is the only limiting factor. Remote viewing, consultation, and laboratory performance through digitization is already a reality; could remote surgery be far behind? Will patients have their medical/dental data on personal devices or websites, interfacing with practical/hospital programs? Will we discover a swift way to electronically anesthetize nerve tissue, or stimulate healing? Yes, it is an exciting time to be entering the field of dentistry.

But, it is also a time which demands the highest honor in our profession. Remember those ideals of honestly, caring and sympathy? With such developments in our field, come great risks and thus, responsibilities. Our graduates must choose wisely, not just for each patient, but also for humanity. Is this treatment in the best interest of the patient? We believe UNLV SDM instills a skill set significant enough to "do not harm" while delivering complex medical treatment for dental diseases. Graduates know how to maintain patient confidentiality in light of computerized genetic information. They will "give back" to the human community bases upon sound research evidence parameters.

We know these are complex issues, but we believe UNLV SDM builds the skills to address them. Our school has a strong foundation in the biomedical sciences, in the medical model of assessment, in the general practice delivery of care through sound business techniques, and an emphasis of volunteerism throughout the curriculum. Graduates learn to question and critically think, to evaluate research, to practice and assess their performance, and to communicate across social, economic, and educational levels. They are a technologically savvy generation, displaying both hand skill and diverse knowledge management. For all of these reasons, we are confident that graduates from UNLV School of Dental Medicine exemplify the very qualities needed over the next few decades to keep dentistry in the forefront of medical delivery of health care.