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Programs and Admissions Overview

The School of Dental Medicine at the University of Colorado Denver (UCD) Anschutz Medical Campus is literally on the move.  On September of 2005, dental students began attending classes in the new state-of-the-art Lazzara Center for Oral-Facial Health located at the former Fitzsimons Army Medical Center in Aurora. 

The Lazzara Center is part of the redevelopment of the former medical center into a major urban university.  Hailed as the largest medical biotech redevelopment project in the United States, the new campus includes the University of Colorado Hospital, the Anschutz Centers for Advanced Medicine, the Rocky Mountain Lions Eye Institute and the Bioscience Park Center.  In addition to the School of Dental Medicine, this integrated redevelopment will also include education space for the UCD Anschutz Medical Campus Schools of Medicine, Nursing, Pharmacy, and Graduate School, combined with cutting-edge research laboratories, critical-care clinics and emerging biotech firms.

The School of Dental Medicine’s mission is to create programs of excellence in education, research, service and patient care.  The dental school enrolls 50 dental students and 18 dental hygiene students annually.  In addition to our nationally recognized D.D.S. and dental hygiene programs, our post-doctoral programs are thriving.  Our new orthodontics and dentofacial ortho-pedics program enrolled its first class of residents in August of 2004.  Our pediatric dentistry program (a collaborative program with the Children’s Hospital) at the Healthy Smiles Clinic is doing very well and had the largest applicant pool in the program’s history.  This clinic offers dental care to children who are medically underserved or indigent, and serves as an integral part of the dental school’s newly developed children’s oral health initiative.  Consistent with our mission to increase access to education and care, the International Dental Student Program got under way in January of 2005, which offers qualified graduates of foreign dental programs the opportunity to earn a Doctor of Dental Surgery degree.

While the early mission of the school was to produce competent general practitioners, today, with a growing and award-winning research program, which also has relocated to a state-of-the-art research building on the UCD Anschutz Medical Campus, the mission has been expanded.  Research is a vital and growing part of the School of Dental Medicine’s mission, and focuses on both basic science and applied areas of research that address issues related to oral health and disease, cancer research, biomaterials and bioengineering and craniofacial biology.  Specific areas of research include developmental biology of the craniofacial region, cell and molecular biology of the oral facial tissues, oral pathology, neoplastic development and the development of polymers and other dental materials science and clinical dental research.  Continued research is vital to the dental industry as a whole as the concept of evidence-based dentistry is embraced.    

As we look toward 2007 and beyond, there will be continued growth in our educational offerings, research programs and patient care programs.  We are indeed a dental school on the move.

History

Creation of the UCD School of Dental Medicine was authorized in 1922 by an amendment to the State constitution.

Activation of the dental school began in 1957, when the Regents of the University unanimously approved its establishment.  In the spring of 1967, the Colorado Legislature authorized initial capital construction and operating funds for the School of Dental Medicine, and in August the Board of Regents appointed a dean.  On December 7, 1967, the Council on Dental Education of the American Dental Association classified the school as eligible for accreditation.  Faculty recruitment began in 1968.  Educational programming and space planning proceeded at once. 

The first dental hygiene students graduated in May 1975.  The first dental students graduated in May 1977.

Doctor of Dental Surgery Program
Dental Hygiene Program
Orthodontics Program
International Student Program (ISP)

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