Dental education in Singapore - From the past to the future

Abstract

Dental education in Singapore has come a long way since the founding of the Dental School in 1929. With an initial intake of 7 students, the Faculty has over the years produced more than 1700 graduates. Its early years were fraught with physical constraints and recruitment problems. With a dedicated core of leaders and good planning, the dental school has over come many of these shortcomings. The King Edward VII College of Medicine played a significant role in the early years of the school's development. Many a student of the past era has pleasant memories that bind and bond them to the SGH Sepoy Lines campus. Acquiring full Dental Faculty status in 1966, the progress of dental education took on a new urgency and stature. The basic medical science subjects were taught to the dental students by our medical colleagues at Sepoy Lines and now continue to be tutored at the Kent Ridge campus. With the shift of the Faculty in 1986 to Kent Ridge (NUS-NUH), together with the implementation of the changed curriculum in 1990 and 1997, the Faculty of Dentistry remains at the forefront of pedagogy and technology to train the future generation of dentists for Singapore.