← Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
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- [00:00]
A
This is Scott Becker with the Becker's Healthcare Podcast and the Becker Dental Podcast. I am thrilled today to be joined by a really special guest. We're joined by Dr. Kut Alkabezi. Dr. Alcabezi is the Assistant Dean of Clinical affairs at the University of Maryland School of Dentistry. Brilliant to visit with her today. She's going to tell us about what she does, her career trend she's watching and a lot more. Dr. Elkabayzi, could you take a moment and introduce yourself and tell us a bit about the University of Maryland School of Dentistry?
- [00:31]
B
Good morning and thank you for having me. Scott. My name is Kura Kobezi. I am currently a faculty member at the University of Maryland School of Dentistry and my role is the Assistant Dean of Clinical affairs at the school. I am internationally trained dentist and have spent most of my career in higher education within the United States as well as globally. I have been in the University of Maryland collectively for about 12 years. Four of those were spent in residency and graduate school work. And then I returned back, was recruited as a faculty member and spent the past eight years as the General Dentistry Residency Program Director. I'm also involved in global partnership programs at the school and serve as the Director of Global Partnerships and Educational Initiatives in Rwanda. A little about umb, which is a University of Maryland, Baltimore. We are the only public institution that graduates most of the healthcare professionals and it's really a privilege to work at the School of Dentistry because as you may and may not know, but the School of Dentistry is the first dental school in the world and it was established in 1840.
- [01:41]
A
Amazing. I did not know that it was the first dental school in the world. What does. I'm going to ask you two questions very unrelated. First, dentist dental shortages in the U.S. what does that look like? What does it look like in terms of the number of dentists versus our population and other specialties within dentistry? How does that look? And second, have you been to Rwanda as part of dentistry, as part of the partnership? And what is Rwanda like and what does dentistry like in Rwanda?
- [02:07]
B
Shortages right now, especially after Covid, impact the dental hygienist. So there's a significant shortage in dental hygienists within the community. And that really poses an issue for a lot of the patients and especially the rural areas, because the dentists now are not only saddled with doing the dental work, but also providing significant preventative services for recall patients. Your second question, which is about Rwanda. I have been to rwanda back in 22. It was a short visit just to Establish relationship as well as to execute the agreement that we have between the University of Maryland and the University of Rwanda. We have a trip coming up this fall, so in about a couple of months where a team of faculty, including me, will be traveling to Rwanda. During this visit, we'll be delivering some patient care as well as will be paired up with local dentists who. So that we assist them well, we exchange knowledge and expertise, but also assist them with delivery of care. Rwanda, if you know or don't know, but back in the mid-90s, they had a very horrific genocide. And through that genocide, they have lost a lot of their health care workforce. And so they had to reestablish their workforce capacity. And before, before 2018, they did not have a dental school there. So one of my predecessors at the School of Dentistry helped the University of Rwanda establish a dental school and they graduated the first class in 2018. So the workforce, right now, the dental workforce is the significant group is what they call dental therapists. And I believe their dentist to population ratio is about 1 to 92,000, if I'm not wrong, and that's probably old data, but they don't have a lot of dentists in Rwanda.
- [04:18]
A
So in Rwanda, one dentist for 92,000 people, real shortages and so forth. What trends are you watching in dentistry and dental education here? How does the AI impact dental education and how are people looking at that dentistry?
- [04:32]
B
The way we deliver dentistry and we teach dentistry is really influenced by digital modalities. Digital dentistry enables the providers to be more efficient and precise. So as an educator, we, we have to be very knowledgeable. What's on the market and how do we incorporate it. As, you know, a lot of these technologies, they die fast, they require a lot of maintenance. But they are really what our students are excited about and it allows them to have the tools to work in rural areas. Because with digital dentistry, you're able to deliver more and with a wider scope of practice. In terms of AI, you know, we have a department within the school that handles a lot of the AI research. But AI definitely in education and treatment will allow us to enhance diagnosis diseases such as dental decay, monitor bone loss, disease outcome and progression, especially with, you know, gum disease. The other thing that we're watching as well, in terms of preclinical training, I'm just going to take one step back. Our students spend the first couple of years in labs where they're learning how to deliver dentistry on plastic teeth with virtual and augmented reality. There's all these tools available now that allows the students to really get a feel of how a natural tooth is going to feel like and how the handpiece is going to react to the natural tooth. So it really develops their fine motor skills. I'm going to say possibly a lot better than just working on plastic teeth.
- [06:17]
A
Fascinating. So I'm going to take you back to one second. So I just found the stat on dentist ratio here compared to Rwanda. So Rwanda has one dentist per 92,000 people. In the United States, to give people a comparison, there's one dentist per 1,700 people. So that really is a huge, remarkable difference. That really is fascinating. So in terms of education, I'm going to ask you two more questions. Dr. Alcabezi. The, the first is what do you find most interesting about dentistry in the profession today? What do you find? What sort of, like, not necessarily keeps you up at night, but just stimulates your brain. You're like, oh, my God, this is interesting, what we're doing here. And similarly about education and teaching and developing, you know, programs. What's most interesting and exciting to you.
- [06:59]
B
From dental school to residency there was digital. Dentistry was new at its infancy, but it was very, very primitive. The leap it took from, I'm going to say, the past eight to ten years is amazing. So it's really exciting to work with the machines and see what they're capable of and allowing us to work very differently. The patients are fascinated. They're more comfortable with digital modalities. The current generation of dentists in training, they're excited by technology. They love their phones, their computers, anything that works fast. So I find dentistry really fascinating, I think is going to open up a lot of doors, you know, for us. In terms of clinical practice, that's fantastic.
- [07:44]
A
And in terms of, like, developing programs, clinical programs, serving as dean or assistant dean, what's the most interesting part of that?
- [07:54]
B
First of all, working with students is amazing because I love the relationship part. You know, establishing a relationship, getting to know people. You always feel young when you work in university because you see what's the latest and greatest. Constantly. Let me just, you know, this is just. Being in higher ed is just amazing. But in terms of developing programs, you know, you're in higher ed, you're constantly being challenged. It's very different to, you know, being in a. In a practice environment, knowing how the current generations work and how they enjoy learning. And just the changes that you make in the learning environment and seeing the outcome of the changes that you make make is very gratifying. Learning and getting people to work together, building a Unified vision is just, it's exciting, it excites me, it keeps me going, and it just, you know, just infuses a lot of, you know, passion in me.
- [08:55]
A
So, Dr. Al Qabesi, let me ask you this question and I'll give you sort of different variants of the question. What advice do you give to an emerging dentist today? An emerging leader today, Someone who's going to dental school. Is it worth it? Is still a good decision. Should they be excited about their career? What advice do you give to somebody who's going into medical school today or dental school today and going to dentistry? And what advice to an emerging leader?
- [09:17]
B
Working in health care is amazing. It is a significant change in lifestyle because you have to be there for your patients and your community all the time. And it is a huge responsibility. But on the same token, it's great because people look up to you, you become inspirational to a lot of people and you develop a lot of good relationships. But dental school, medical school, you know, any healthcare school, professional school, is a lot of work. And I would say looking back and my journey, first thing I would say to myself is to allow yourself grace to learn, make mistakes, be open up to new opportunities, invest in yourself, you know, learn, be open minded, be a lifelong student, be humble and, you know, always explore new opportunities to get out of your comfort zone. Because really, getting out of the comfort zone is what's going to get you to learn. I have enjoyed and I will continue to enjoy being a dentist. I think dentistry opened up a lot of opportunities in my life that I otherwise it wouldn't. They wouldn't have presented themselves to me.
- [10:34]
A
Amazing. And let me ask you a question. I'll ask you another question, and I hate to keep you longer, but such an interesting career. The difference in practicing, I think you also practiced and taught in, I take it in England at Leeds University. And the difference in practicing in the United Kingdom versus here. You also did some of your education or taught in Kuwait. So you've had this incredible international career. Just give us two seconds on the differences. Practicing or teaching in Kuwait versus practicing here versus England. I mean, you gave us this great contrast, Rwanda versus here. Give us one more sense of the international flavor between Kuwait, England, here, if that's okay.
- [11:20]
B
Yes, of course. I grew up in Kuwait and I left Kuwait to pursue dentistry in England. And then after that I moved back to Kuwait and I started early in my career in Kuwait. I practiced and I taught at the university and completed my post grad in the United States. And then I, of course returned to work here. Dentistry is different, slightly different. Your approach working with patients is different. Dentistry in England as well as in Kuwait is socialized. The approach to dentistry, especially general dentistry, is a little different between Kuwait versus Westernized countries such as England and the United States. When you deliver dentistry in certain parts of the world, it's more focused on what they call episodic care, which is whenever the patient needs, you know, senses pain or they feel or they perceive that they have a problem, they would go to the dentist and they get treated and they go. But the approach, you know, in westernized countries is usually you have the patient establishes dental home and then you provide them long term care and sometimes their family is part of the practice, so you provide comprehensive care. The other, I would say significant difference between working here versus and this is just in general westernized countries as well is patients, patient is, you know, patients have autonomy and they're usually part of the decision process. In certain parts of the world, such as Kuwait, patients usually look up to you to make the decision for them. And they, you know, the majority of the population expects they're not really that engaged and their dental awareness is not as high or what they call the dental IQ as high as the population population in the United States or the United Kingdom. So the dentistry in Europe tends to be a little more on the conservative side, and the dentistry in the United States tends to be more towards the mechanical side. And having trained in two different continents, my approach combines and utilizes either approach depending on the patient and the case that I have. And being in Kuwait, I was able to do that because most of, I'm going to say the Gulf nations in the Middle East, a lot of the dentists and the health care providers have received postgraduate training internationally. So they bring that blend together in that country. So I would say there are differences in the approach, but also there are differences in how you deliver the dentistry in various parts of the world.
- [14:14]
A
Fascinating. Dr. Alcabezi, what a pleasure to visit with you. What an amazing career, what an amazing leader. Thank you so much for joining us today on the special episode of the Becker's Healthcare podcast, the Becker's Dental Podcast. Thank you very, very much for joining us.
- [14:27]
B
Thank you for having me, Scott.