SFG / DTA Scholars: “A comparative ‘outcomes assessment’ of selected dental practice curricula, with an eye toward developing improved instructional materials for dental students and practitioners”

The SFG / DTA Scholars program was one of the first rounds of projects the DTA Foundation (ADTA Foundation at the time) funded as an organization, in partnership with the Santa Fe Group. The following is an excerpt from the 2004 project report.

This project has the long range goal of permitting comparative analyses of dental practice management across dental schools with an eye toward improving instructional materials and teaching methods. Using the University of Nevada curriculum as a benchmark, the investigator worked with faculty there and at selected other institutions to determine the goals and objectives of practice management curricula in dental schools. She then prepared a survey instrument to solicit information on the intended curricular outcomes. Data reports from forty-eight dental schools around the country were very slow in coming in, and thus analysis was pushed back several months. The investigator found that only about one-fourth of the responding dental schools devoted more than 30 hours to practice management instruction. Many schools incorporate the notion that dentists, as professionals, must interact with their broader communities, although this message tends to receive less emphasis in the latter years of dental training. The general intent of this research is to identify student skills and competencies (in practice management) as they approach graduation and to “benchmark” graduates prior to tracking them in the early stages of their careers. As noted, results of this study will likely be of use to other dental educators and should help improve management of the Nation’s dental practices. Assistance for this project was provided by the University of Nevada-Las Vegas School of Dental Medicine, particularly the research committee, and by American Dental Education Association’s Section on Practice Administration.