DENTAL SCHOOL IN DUNEDIN

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25608, 24 September 1948, Page 3

DENTAL SCHOOL IN DUNEDIN

DEAN’S HOPES FOR FUTURE

« FINEST TEACHING HOSPITAL IN EMPIRE ”

The aim of the Dean of the National Dental School in Dunedin (Dr. J. P. Walsh) now that a new building has been promised for the school, is to establish a school which will become the finest teaching dental hospital in the British Empire. ‘‘We can progress, Or we’ can sit back and be complacent and stagnate,” he said, in Dunedin recently. “We are far enough removed from other teaching centres to be able to have a proper perspective of the advances being made elsewhere. Their work could be turned to our profit if we sifted the information made available by the best brains overseas, and used only the best of it.”

Linked with all plans for advancement was the problem of adequate finance, he said. The present set-up for the treatment of patients was riddled with anomalies. Because social security 'benefits did not usually apply to dental work, special treatment .for malformation of the jaws, or other complaints which came within the scope of the work of the school and its staff must be paid for by the patient. or charged against the limited grant under which the school operated.

A full-scale dental teaching hospital would facilitate the treatment of patients. who came from all parts of the Dominion for specialist advice and treatment, increase the opportunities for post-graduate specialist work, and result in the carrying out of research of ever-increasing value. During the last two or three years there had been considerable research at the school. Dr. Walsh continued, but the scope was limited by the funds available. - The most recent extension of the school’s work had been the taking over of a kindergarten, so that preventive work could be carried out. necessary operations made, and advice given to parents and children on dental matters. As no special grant was available for the work, it must be paid for from the general funds of the school. It appeared that any expansion to take in successive age groups and study the effects of treatment through the years was impossible, because of lack of funds and accommodation.

The school, which in the past produced an average of 13 graduates each year, was now committed to the training of between 40 and 50 students each year. The present cramped quarters would mske it impossible for such a project to be satisfactory, but Dr. Walsh hoped that the promised new building would materialise in good time.