GSDM Alumni Meet at Annual ADA Meeting in San Antonio

Many members of the Boston University Henry M. Goldman School of Dental Medicine (GSDM) community attended the 2014 American Dental Association (ADA) Annual Session, held October 8–11 in San Antonio, Texas. At this year’s Session, GSDM congratulated the latest inductees into both the American College of Dentists (ACD) and the International College of Dentists (ICD), and announced that GSDM is the first dental school in the nation to go completely digital.

During the ADA Session, Dean and Mrs. Jeffrey W. Hutter hosted a reception for GSDM alumni on Saturday, October 11, at the Mokara Hotel & Spa. Dean Hutter addressed the attendees: “It is wonderful to see so many of our alumni, faculty, staff, students, family members, and friends here tonight.” He continued, “I especially would like to congratulate the 15 alumni and faculty who were inducted into the American and International Colleges of Dentists. It is a wonderful accomplishment and one you should feel very proud in achieving.”

The ACD and the ICD recognize dentists for their individual achievements, leadership, and contributions to dentistry and society.

The GSDM inductees to the ACD were: Elvis Babo DMD 01; Cherae M. Farmer-Dixon DPH 14; Associate Dean for Global & Population Health Michelle Henshaw MPH 96, DSc 07; and Amir Mehrabi ENDO 05.

The GSDM inductees to the ICD were: Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of General Dentistry Charilaos Asikis; Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of General Dentistry Laura Bacerra PERIO 04, DMD 10; Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of General Dentistry David Dano AEGD 12; Frank A. DeQuattro DMD 98, ORTHO 01; Assistant Dean for Business Development Dr. Margaret Errante; Harish Gulati PGOE 05; Assistant Professor in the Department of General Dentistry Bing Liu DSc 99, DMD 03; I. Blake McKinley, Jr ENDO 97; Gigi Meinecke DMD 88; Amir Mehrabi ENDO 05; and David H. Schneider DMD 81, PERIO 83.

During the alumni reception, Dean Hutter proudly announced that on August 29, 2014 GSDM signed an agreement with Sirona Dental Systems, and as a result of this collaboration, GSDM is the first dental school in the nation to transition entirely to seamlessly integrated digital dentistry. With the implementation of digital dentistry, GSDM has committed itself to providing state-of-the-art technology to its students, faculty, and staff, and fostering its use by practitioners in the community.

Dean Hutter said, “The transition to digital dentistry will be an enormous benefit for our students and our patients. Once fully implemented, all patient data will feed into a comprehensive digital record allowing experts, world-wide, to access a patient’s record when necessary.” He continued, “Intra-oral digital images, intra-oral exams, and digital scans of hard and soft tissues will then be accessible through a comprehensive record. Ancillary information such as photographs, computerized axial tomography, cone beam, cephalometric, panoramic, and facial scans will also be attached to the digital record. This data may then be overlaid and interact to produce a complete digital representation of the patient, including 3-D renderings of the face.”

As a result of the seamless digital dentistry transition, GSDM students, residents, and faculty will be able to engage in comprehensive treatment planning without the need for the physical presence of the patient, saving valuable patient time. Furthermore, this transition presents a unique opportunity to conduct an innovative program of comparative effectiveness research on digital dentistry, which will allow GSDM to play a leading role in advancing evidence-based dentistry in the US and the world.

Dean Hutter concluded by saying, “Not only is digital dentistry an enormously beneficial change in the world of dental medicine and patient care, it is going to absolutely transform dental education.”

Photos of the ICD and ACD induction ceremonies are available on Facebook and Flickr.