Academic Pre-Orientation Program for Dental Students: Beginning and End of Program Evaluations, 1998-2016.

Admitting students from non-traditional or disadvantaged backgrounds can increase the diversity of dental school classes. The aims of this study were to analyze how interested non-traditional incoming dental students were at the beginning of an academic pre-orientation program in learning about basic science, dentistry-related topics, and academic skills; how confident they were in doing well in basic science and dentistry-related courses; and how they evaluated the program at the end. The relationships between personal (interest/confidence) and structural factors (program year, number of participants) and program evaluations were also explored. All 360 students in this program at the University of Michigan from 1998 to 2016 were invited to participate in surveys at the beginning and end of the educational intervention. A total of 353 students responded at the beginning (response rate 98%), and 338 responded at the end (response rate 94%). At the beginning, students were more interested in learning about basic science and dentistry-related topics than about academic skills, and they were more confident in their dentistry- related than basic science-related abilities. At the end, students valued basic science and dentistry-related education more positively than academic skills training. Confidence in doing well and interest in basic science and dentistry-related topics were correlated. The more recent the program was, the less confident the students were in their basic science abilities and the more worthwhile they considered the program to be. The more participants the program had, the more confident the students were, and the better they evaluated their basic science and dentistry-related education. Overall, this academic pre-orientation program was positively evaluated by the participants.

Recruiting underrepresented minority and low-income high school students into dentistry while educating dental and dental hygiene students about academic careers.

The objectives of this project were to create a program that would expose underrepresented minority (URM) and low income (LI) high school students to dental professions and provide an opportunity for dental and dental hygiene students from URM/LI groups to be engaged in teaching activities. Data were collected from participants during the school years 2009-10 (high school students: N=23, dental students: N=21, dental hygiene students: N=5) and 2010-11 (N=27, N=11, N=3, respectively). The students participated in fifteen Saturday sessions from October through March each year. The data showed that, from the beginning, mentees and mentors were very interested in participating in the program and getting to know each other. Lectures, general program activities, and patient-related events such as organizing a health fair and shadowing during two outreach clinics were evaluated positively by mentees and mentors. The end of program evaluations showed that the program and the mentee-mentor relationships were rated very positively and that the mentees had an increased interest in oral health-related careers. In conclusion, creating opportunities for URM/LI high school students to explore dental careers and for dental and dental hygiene students to engage in teaching resulted in positive experiences for both groups.

Dental education: evolving student trends.

As the health care professionals of tomorrow, the students of today are the future of our profession and will shape both dentistry and dental education. To provide historical perspective on today's students, this article summarizes trends in the demographics of allied, predoctoral, and advanced dental students in the United States over the past seventy-five years and reviews efforts made to promote the racial/ethnic diversity of these groups of students. These efforts include legislative initiatives and public and privately funded programs. An outlook for the future considers ways in which new technologies and social networks as well as coordinated interprofessional efforts might further promote the goal of educating students who reflect the diversity of the United States and position the oral health workforce to meet the country's needs.

Perception of general and oral health in White and African American adults: assessing the effect of neighborhood socioeconomic conditions.

OBJECTIVES: This study investigates the independent and joint effects of family income and neighborhood socioeconomic status (SES) on general health and oral health before and after controlling for traditional risk factors in a representative sample of adults aged 18+ years residing in the Detroit tri-county area, Michigan. METHODS: Individuals data were obtained through interviews, while neighborhood data came from the 1990 US Census. SUDAAN was used to accommodate the complex sampling design and correlation of outcomes within the same neighborhoods. RESULTS: Whites in disadvantaged neighborhoods were four times more likely to rate their oral health as fair or poor [odds ratio (OR): 4.0; 95% confidence intervals (CI): 1.6-10.3] than their counterparts in advantaged neighborhoods. When evaluating the joint effects of family income and neighborhood SES, low-income Whites in disadvantaged neighborhoods were six times more likely to rate their oral health as fair or poor (OR: 6.4; 95% CI: 1.6-26.5) than their high-income counterparts in advantaged neighborhoods. The odds of rating general health as fair or poor was six times greater in low-income African Americans in disadvantaged neighborhoods (OR: 6.1; 95% CI: 1.6-23.8) than high-income African Americans in advantaged neighborhoods. Similarly, low-income African Americans in disadvantaged neighborhoods were almost three times (OR: 2.8; 95% CI: 1.0-8.1) more likely to rate their oral health as fair/poor than high-income African Americans in advantaged neighborhoods. CONCLUSIONS: SES conditions at the neighborhood-level, independently or jointly with individual-level income, appear to be important in evaluating racial/ethnic differences in self-rated oral health. Neighborhood conditions could tap into constructs not captured by individual-level variables on self-rated oral health.

Factors influencing the effect of race on established periodontitis prevalence.

OBJECTIVE: This paper identifies differences in prevalence of established periodontitis and evaluates factors that might explain the differences between non-Hispanic African Americans (n = 232) and whites (n = 199) in the Detroit tricounty area. METHODS: Subjects from a disproportionate probability sample of community-dwelling adults were interviewed regarding demographic, psychosocial and enabling factors, dental health-related behaviors, and other risk factors, and had comprehensive in-home dental examinations. RESULTS: The overall prevalence of established periodontitis was 20.8 percent; African Americans exhibited a significantly higher prevalence than whites (29.8% vs 17.7%). The crude association between race and prevalence of established periodontitis was significant (odds ratio [OR] for African Americans = 1.98; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 1.17,3.34). After controlling for other covariates, we found the effect of race may be modified by dental checkup visit frequency: African Americans with dental checkups at least once a year had almost a fourfold higher odds of established periodontitis (OR = 3.64; 95% CI = 1.43, 9.24) than their white counterparts with dental checkups at least once a year (the referent group); while African Americans with a dental checkups once every two years or less often were more than fourfold less likely to have established periodontitis (OR = 0.22; 95% CI = 0.08, 0.59) than their white counterparts in the referent group. CONCLUSIONS: This analysis supports the disparity in periodontal health as part of the black:white health disparity when taking other factors into account. However, periodontal health disparities may be more complex than previously recognized, requiring greater understanding of factors related to dental care utilization in future studies evaluating this disparity.