From Classroom to Community to Career The OHIO Project Gives Fourth-Year Dental Students Real-World Experience Making the leap from the classroom to the real world is a daunting transition faced by new graduates everywhere, regardless of their profession. Ohio State College of Dentistry alumni are helping ease the transition by providing soon-to-be graduates with real-world experience in tandem with their classroom curriculum. Through the OHIO Project (Oral Health Improvement through Outreach), fourth-year students work with College of Dentistry alumni who supervise them as they provide a variety of treatments to diverse populations in a number of different settings. Participating students must complete 50 days of in-clinic experience before graduation. Students spend up to a month at a site before rotating to another site, where they gain a different experience. “I wish they’d had a project like this when I was in school,” said Dr. Deani Deskins-Knebel ’92, Dental Director at the Columbus Health Department and an OHIO Project partner from the beginning. “Students who graduate now are better prepared,” she said. “The use of time, their confidence, and the level of skill they display is greatly improved.”
The OHIO Project was started at the college in 2003 when the program was funded by a five-year, $1.5 million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Initial OHIO Project partners included the Columbus Health Department, Ohio State’s Nisonger Center, the Cincinnati Health Department, and Nationwide Children’s Hospital. Today, the OHIO Project has expanded in scope to include more than 20 sites, offering a diverse set of options for students, both in terms of treatment styles and patient demographics.
Service & Opportunity Dr. Matthew Kanetsky ’09 participated in the OHIO Project as a College of Dentistry student, and is now committed to supporting the program by volunteering as a supervising dentist. “Participating in the OHIO Project was the best part of my overall education,” he said. Dr. Kanetsky is the site coordinator for the OHIO Project at the Chillicothe Veterans’ Medical Center and said that students who work with him get to “see patients who are medically compromised and learn what it’s like to work with this special population (veterans).” “The students don’t usually get to see rural areas and how some patients live,” Dr. Kanetsky said. “The experience can be rather eyeopening.” Five of the top 10 reasons people go to emergency rooms in Central Ohio involve dental pain, Dr. DeskinsKnebel added. “They go to the ER if they can’t pay; [for some] it’s hard to afford dental care.” She said students who treat these underserved individuals are often surprised by the gratitude they receive.
Dr. Deani Deskins-Knebel ‘92 4 ohio state dental journal
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