Faculty: Create dental dept.

The Faculty Senate unanimously approved a proposal to create a dental medicine department at UNM.

UNM’s dental medicine programs are under the Health Science Center’s Department of Surgery but have grown large enough to need their own department, the proposal said.

Most University Health Science Centers already have a dentistry department, UNM Chief of Dental Services Gary Cuttrell said.
“We’re just bringing UNM’s health sciences up to the
standard of most health science centers with a department of dentistry,” he said.

Faculty Senate President-elect Tim Ross said UNM should have a dentistry department because dental hygiene programs don’t belong under a surgery department.

“There’s already a dentistry sciences program, and for years it’s existed under the Department of Surgery at UNM …,” he said. “But we also have dental hygienist training, and they really shouldn’t be under the department of surgery.”

Ross also said the proposal is cost-neutral and won’t impact UNM’s budget.

Giving the Division of Dentistry department status could attract much-needed faculty to the University’s dental program, the proposal said, and attract talented hygiene students and dental residents to the University.

Cuttrell said he hopes a dentistry department will draw attention to UNM’s existing oral education services.

“I think that a lot of people are unaware that UNM even has these dental services, so hopefully this will draw attention to that, too,” he said.

The unanimous approval of the proposal shows that faculty understand the importance of UNM’s dental programs, Cuttrell said.

“It goes to show the appreciation that people really do have for oral health education in New Mexico,” he said.