Making a Difference Across Our State

One of our School’s greatest success stories is our community outreach program. During the final year of their dental and dental hygiene education, students travel to sites across Michigan and work with our partners providing care to needy patients of all ages.

Dental students Nancy Lam (left) and Macare Kelly (right) were among those who administered oral health care to youngsters last summer during the School's annual Summer Migrant Dental Clinic Program.

It’s an arrangement that benefits everyone - students, partners, and patients in communities large and small.

Outreach is nothing new for our School. It’s a long-term tradition.

Community outreach took a major step forward in 2000 when our dental and dental hygiene students began working in clinics outside of the dental school during the academic year. That was a significant change. Before then, community outreach usually occurred only during the summer and only at a few locations.

Now our fourth-year dental students work with our partners for a total of four weeks at eight sites in seven different communities. Our dental hygiene students participate in one-week rotations during the final year of their studies. This report focuses on how those two groups of students, working with our partners, are making a difference across Michigan.

48,000 Patients, 71,000 Procedures

In just the past five years, they have treated more than 48,000 patients and performed more than 71,000 procedures.

The demand for the oral health services our students provide as they work with our partners is driven to a large degree by the condition of the Michigan economy.

Last November, U-M economists said that since mid-2000, our state has lost nearly 400,000 jobs, 70 percent of which were in the manufacturing sector, the core of our state’s economy. In 2007, Michigan’s unemployment rate hit 7.6%, its highest in 14 years.

With job loss, there is also a loss of insurance coverage, both medical and dental, for workers and their families. The dental clinics where our students rotate serve those with no insurance, the underinsured, or those receiving Medicaid assistance for dental care.

The forecast for 2008 is more of the same - 51,000 net job losses and a rise in the unemployment rate to just over 8 percent. Unfortunately, U-M economists do not predict any net job gains until next year, at the earliest.

That means the demand for low-cost dental care will continue to increase. Our partners and our students are responding enthusiastically.

Whether they are in Grand Rapids, Saginaw, Lansing, Muskegon Heights, Baldwin, Oscoda, or Ypsilanti during the academic year, or in Bay Cliff or the Traverse City area during the summer, our students return with renewed enthusiasm. As Dr. Bill Piskorowski, our director of outreach and community affairs notes, many students say their outreach experience was the highlight of their four years in dental school.

I invite you to spend some time learning more about our partners and how our dental and dental hygiene students are reaching out to serve. They are making a difference in lives and in communities.

Peter Polverini
Dean
University of Michigan
School of Dentistry