Sept. 20, 2002. Boston University Goldman School of Dental Medicine (BUSDM) has been awarded $1.35 million dollars from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The five-year grant, awarded through the Foundation's Pipeline, Profession and Practice: Community-Based Dental Education program, will support the school's efforts to increase enrollment of minority and low-income students into dental schools, increase the number of dental schools with community-based practice sites, and expand access to oral health care for vulnerable populations through dental school and community partnerships.
BUSDM was awarded the grant based on its proposal to develop the New England Dental Access Project (NEDAP) at BUSDM. The goals of NEDAP are 1) to develop and enlarge community-based clinical education programs at BUSDM that provide care to underserved populations throughout New England, and 2) to develop, implement, and monitor programs to increase recruitment and retention of underrepresented minority and low-income students.
Based on letters of intent from 44 dental schools, BUSDM was one of 22 schools invited to submit a full application, and was subsequently site visited as part of the application process. BUSDM joins nine other schools of dental medicine as recipients of the grants.
"We are honored to receive this important award," said Spencer N. Frankl, professor and dean of BUSDM. "Our commitment to the community, minority student recruitment, and access to care for all will be significantly strengthened and supported by the generous support of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.
"To fully realize the goals of NEDAP, the core of existing courses will be modified and new courses will be developed with a focus on cultural competence and practicing the public health model," says Frankl. "The aim of modifying the existing courses is to better assist students in identifying and addressing dental care needs of underserved communities, provide care that is culturally appropriate, learn how best to provide dental care to the underserved in a private practice setting, health centers, and other institutional settings, and to create community-based prevention programs to reduce dental diseases in vulnerable populations," said Frankl.
The Surgeon General's Report on the Oral Health of the Nation released in May 2000 showed that although oral health in the United States has improved greatly over the last half-century, there is a silent epidemic of oral disease affecting poor children, the elderly, and many members of racial and ethnic minorities. At the same time, according to the American Dental Education Association, the numbers of underrepresented minority students enrolling in the nation's dental schools is far below their proportion in the U.S. population and has dropped significantly over the last decade.
Dental schools funded through the Pipeline program will work to counteract these trends. They will forge partnerships that enable their students, residents, and faculty to work with private practitioners, health agencies, hospitals, schools, clinics, and other community organizations to provide services to populations with poor oral health and limited access to dental care. The chosen institutions also will develop strategies to recruit more low-income students and more African-American, Latino, Native American, and other underrepresented minorities into dentistry.