The Faculty of Dentistry’s Doctor of Dental Medicine program is a fully accredited four-year program. Following a minimum of two years of prerequisite studies, dental students complete four years of intense study including extensive clinical experience and are granted a D.M.D. degree.

Upon successful completion of the National Dental Examining Board examination, graduates are entitles to apply for a license to practice in all provinces of Canada; however, other jurisdictions, both in Canada and the United States, may require additional licensing requirements. The D.M.D. degree provides the foundation for a variety of career paths, including further training in dental specialties and research.

The curriculum is designed to ensure that students graduate as competent dentists, prepared to meet the oral health care needs of their patients. It provides knowledge of basic biomedical, behavioural and clinical sciences; biomaterials; cognitive and behavioural skills; and professional and ethical values necessary for practice as a dental professional.

Over the course of the curriculum, emphasis shifts from teaching – to learning, from guided performance – to independent performance, from gaining knowledge in the foundation sciences and skills in the preclinical labs – to treating patients in a simulated practice setting working with their dental hygiene student partners.

The Faculty’s evolving curriculum emphasizes:

• Early clinical exposure: students begin their clinical experiences in the first year of the program.
• Community service learning: students participate in treatment of unique populations at locales outside of the dental school.
• An evidence-based approach: students are trained to make clinical decisions based on the best scientific evidence available.

The curriculum provides opportunities to undertake basic or clinical research, to treat patients with a variety of restorative problems, including implant dentistry, and to attend a hospital clinic where patients with complex medical problems are having their oral health care needs met.

In their final year, students participate in a clinical program in which they provide all aspects of their patients’ treatment needs in a manner resembling a group general practice. Students focus on providing optimal care in a timely manner and practice in an environment that emphasizes the integration of dental and dental hygiene clinical education and the team practice approach.

Not all Canadians are able to access dental care through private dental offices. The Faculty, therefore, offers programs that care for these special-needs individuals. Students are involved in these community outreach programs through externship placement in fourth-year dentistry.

Students learn to value caring for special needs individuals as they experience the following community-based activities:

• Planning and providing care for the financially disadvantaged
• Planning and providing care for those in isolated northern communities
• Providing care for the institutionalized or mobility-restricted elderly
• Observing and participating in care for the mentally disabled
• Promoting oral health within special-needs communities

• The U of M Bachelor of Science in Dentistry degree [B.Sc.(Dent)] permits a small number of interested dental students to undertake research during two summers of their undergraduate education.
• Dental graduates may apply for one of three advanced education one-year Hospital Dental internships at the Health Sciences Centre: two in general dentistry and one in children’s dentistry.
• The Faculty of Dentistry offers graduate education in four clinical specialities: Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, Orthodontics, and Periodontics. For those interested in pursuing basic science research, the Department of Oral Biology grants both M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees.