IDEP DDS Clinical Experience
How many clinical hours will I have? You will receive more than 2,000 hours of patient-care learning experiences. Your clinical component begins in July. You will immediately see patients.
Where do I receive my clinical education? The primary clinical education occurs in the School of Dentistry’s Center for Oral Health Care & Research, part of UT Health San Antonio.
Students are divided into eight General Practice Groups (GPGs). Additionally, there are advanced education program clinics and community-based clinics to which students are sent.
How many operatories are in the clinic where I will work? There are 220 operatories for the General Practice Group clinics. Each advanced education program has its own clinic with varying numbers of operatories.
What types of procedures will students be expected to perform? For graduation, students must demonstrate they are competent in 31 areas.
Will students be assigned to a team? IDEP students integrate with the third- and fourth-year students from our undergraduate dental program. You will join your General Practice Group in July. You also will have community-based clinical rotations and departmental rotations to gain a well-rounded clinical experience.
Our students benefit from being placed in small groups in the first year. Groups are 12 to 15 students, who are working with a general dentist, a prosthodontist and a restorative content expert. Each dental rotation is covered by its respective expert faculty member.
Second-year IDEP students begin more advanced training. You can supplement the advanced basic curriculum by choosing additional training in more than 16 selectives, from periodontal surgery to orthodontics. Students also can be mentored in research, teaching or become active in mission trips, extracurricular activities, dental societies, groups and other functions on campus.
Who supervises and teaches? A wide variety of faculty members teach and/or supervise depending on the procedures being performed. Our General Practice Group clinics have specialists, but the focus of patient care is at the level of a general dentist. Specialists supervise in the advanced education program clinics.
What clinical rotations I will participate in?
Junior year
- Oral Surgery clinic: available at two locations
- Oral Medicine
- Dental Emergency
- Geriatrics
- Pediatric Dentistry clinic: available at two locations
- Periodontics
Senior year
- Dental Emergency
- Dental Hygiene
- Oral Surgery clinic: available at two locations
- Hospital
- Pediatric Dentistry: available at two locations
- Primary Dental Care: South Texas Rotation in Laredo, Texas
- Primary Dental Care: San Antonio Christian Dental Clinic at Haven for Hope
- San Antonio Independent School District
Students also are required to complete a two-week continuous clinical selective, a six-week research selective or another approved plan in the summer prior to the senior year.
Rotations are subject to change due to availability.
Who are my patients? Patients are members of the San Antonio community. We also serve patients from Central and South Texas, an area of more than 50,000 square miles or 130,000 km2. We have patients and clinics in Laredo, Texas, and we serve patients in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. Our patient population is large. It has diverse dental needs.
What else should I know? To assess clinical performance, the School of Dentistry begins with daily, formative assessments that provide a basis for evaluations of student progress.
Each day the covering faculty members take note of how students are integrating their knowledge, technical skills, problem-solving abilities and professional behaviors in the course of patient care and record the results on a daily grade-sheet.
Each month, and again at the end of each semester, the General Practice Group faculty members meet to review the daily notes and create progress reports, which are based on those daily grades.
The School of Dentistry at the UT Health San Antonio’s approach is similar to the way medical and dental residency directors make their assessments. We look at more than just production. We evaluate all aspects of dental care. You will receive input from multiple faculty members. Your grade will be based on overall performance instead of a snapshot of one test on one day.
We have a high standard for our students, and we have a commitment to help students reach that level of excellence. Commitment is a spirit of determination to continue on and to be dedicated and faithful. Our faculty and staff have that commitment to our students.
A code of personal integrity guides us to do the right thing for our patients; our students live by this code, and our students are committed to striving for the highest standards.
Our faculty will evaluate students on patient management and chair-side manner. Students must serve our patients in a professional way to complete the program.