Which dental schools do/don't prepare students enough to need a residency?

[LKaur]

Basically every dental school claims that the program at their school and prepares the students for life after dental school. But how do you know what to believe before attending the school? I'm just wondering if anyone knows any schools where the students felt prepared enough to start practicing right out of school (as opposed to doing a residency) and which schools dont prepare students enough.

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[Oracle DMD]

Honestly I think it’s more about the student than the school. However, if you’re looking for a measurement of how prepared you’ll be, ask how many patients D3s and D4s have. The more patients you have to work on, the more practice you’ll get. If you have to recruit your own patients, that is a very bad sign.

 

[TanMan]

Basically every dental school claims that the program at their school and prepares the students for life after dental school. But how do you know what to believe before attending the school? I'm just wondering if anyone knows any schools where the students felt prepared enough to start practicing right out of school (as opposed to doing a residency) and which schools dont prepare students enough.

I really believe that it's up to the individual and future doctors (dentists) to prepare themselves. Dental schools set the stage, but it's ultimately up to you to integrate what you've learned into a cohesive, working knowledgebase to draw upon. Doing a procedure is easy on most levels, but doing it consistently well and understanding the factors that allow for clinical success is going to be key. Not just that, but interpersonal interaction is also very important in your practice and no school can teach you that. You learn from experience, you learn how to tackle/manage/talk to patients of every part of the spectrum and the idea of being prepared right out of dental school all depends on the person. Some people can do 1 crown and feel ready for private practice whereas some might do 50 and still not feel ready.

Build your confidence and learn to talk to patients. Confidence is key to providing the patient perception of quality and commanding respect of your patients.

 

[Stanelz]

Depends 99% on the individual. Apart from how confident you are some people are also just unlucky compared to others with their patient pool and get significantly less experience.

 

[pubhealthdent]

Basically every dental school claims that the program at their school and prepares the students for life after dental school. But how do you know what to believe before attending the school? I'm just wondering if anyone knows any schools where the students felt prepared enough to start practicing right out of school (as opposed to doing a residency) and which schools dont prepare students enough.

MOSDOH 2018 grad here. I think there were only like 2 in my class that did an AEGD/GPR. Everyone else went straight to specialize or into practice. Compared to friends at other dental schools that graduated the same year, most of my classmates had double the number of fillings, exts, rcts, etc than other schools did.

But at the end of the day it comes down to each person's comfort level and confidence. You'll know if you're prepared or not

 

[dentistrydmd]

It mostly depends on the individual, less so the dental school. Dental school gives you the basics, you learn through practicing for a long time how to be more efficient etc.