August, 2009

Dr. Dean Morton: “Dental Schools need to remain contemporary. Our Students come to the University of Louisville with expectations that they will be prepared for a long and successful career in dentistry. It’s our obligation to remain contemporary with what we teach them. Our students arrive with demands that I think are appropriate. They are asking the University of Louisville to give them an opportunity to learn practice needs for the years ahead. Implants are certainly part of them on the more advanced and complex side of what we teach. The accreditation commission is going to require dental schools to increase both the quantity and the quality of education as it relates to implant dentistry at the pre-doctoral and the post-doctoral level. For us at the University of Louisville we are being proactive.  We are trying very hard to make sure that each of our students that enrolls today is being prepared for the requirements of tomorrow, if you like, so that they will have a contemporary education as it relates to dental implants. Our students need to maintain touch and our faculty also, for that matter, need to maintain touch, with modern technology appropriate procedures. Technology, the digital age, is coming to dentistry. It’s difficult to integrate into our routine, daily life in the dental school, but we are going to have that ready for students by the time our renovation of the Dental school is complete. Not only are we renewing the facility, we’re renewing our approach. That requires a commitment from the faculty also to renew their capability and we’re very fortunate to have a faculty that’s prepared to do that.” END