Types of dental programs?

[kpreet]

Hi everyone,

I was reading dentalworks interview tips and I was looking at the common questions they ask you and it asks:

9. What type of dental program are you interested in?
( Compare two general types of school programs like
Case-Based and Practical or Clinic Oriented)

What does case-based and practical mean? That the school is more research based?

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[Kahr]

What does case-based and practical mean? That the school is more research based?

It seems that link might be possible. However I don't think it's concrete, rather an independent education strategy employed throughout dental school; read: it doesn't necessarily mean the school is research focused.

Case-based/PBL is exactly what it sounds like, getting a group of students (sometimes a group of medical and dental) together to study, interpret, and react to real patient cases using the knowledge recently gained through their didactic studies. Article talking about this at Harvard (HSDM):

http://www.jdentaled.org/content/71/8/1080.full

I always thought practical education applied to all dental schools and was more relevant from the 3rd year onward. However it could simply mean doing more individual or paired lab/clinic work, rather than theory/discussion only. Hard to say, I'm sure someone here has better insight/experience than me on this (dentalWorks input I'm sure in the very least).

Personally I was never asked this question, though it wouldn't surprise me if it came up specifically at schools where case-based learning was in use.