Welcome to the Dental School at the UT Health Science Center San Antonio where it is my pleasure to serve as Dean ad interim. My new role is a result of Dr. Kenneth L. Kalkwarf, who served superbly as our dean for the past 24 years, being appointed the Health Science Center’s President ad interim. We have been very fortunate to have Dr. Kalkwarf at the school’s helm for nearly a quarter century. During that time, the school has been ranked among the very best Dental Schools in America. We have celebrated over 40 years of graduating top oral healthcare professionals, doing pioneering research, and successfully treating tens of thousands of patients. If you would like to send greetings to Dr. Kalkwarf, you can do so at kalkwarf@uthscsa.edu and you can read more about his new role at the university's website.
Change remains in the air at the Dental School, and this being Texas, our changes tend to be big.
Our faculty, students, and staff are excited about the Dental School’s plan to build a flagship clinical facility, the Center for Oral Health Care and Research. This new 4-story, 198,000 square foot state-of-the-art clinic will provide for all aspects of our students’, residents’, faculty, and patients’ clinical experiences and create an environment that supports the finest in multi-specialty patient care. Located on Floyd Curl Drive, just down the road from our current building, our new facility is scheduled to open in July 2015.
Another significant change is the Dental Hygiene program’s move from the School of Health Professions to the Dental School. This move gives dental and dental hygiene students the opportunity to train together and experience the type of working relationships they will find in private practice. On July 8, we were pleased to have the entering hygiene class of 2014 join, for the first time, the incoming dental students at the Welcome to the Profession ceremony, officially blending our two programs.
Dental School faculty are also in the process of reviewing our curriculum, its structure and delivery, to improve its relevance and timeliness to more closely tie the acquisition of biomedical and clinical foundation knowledge to its application in the treatment of patients.
We remain proud of our scientists who are pushing back the frontiers with their research on pain and inflammation, salivary diagnostics, stem cell regeneration of dental tissues, bone regeneration, dental public health and prevention and much more. Our extramural programs continue to provide unique training opportunities for our students while bringing much needed oral health services to many areas of South Texas.
I invite you to continue to explore this website, and if you have the opportunity, visit our school so you can see for yourself how as our Health Science Center’s motto states, “we are making lives better.”
William W. Dodge, DDS
