Quality Assurance in Clinical Dental Education

This book highlights the quality assurance efforts of a dental school, located in a developing country, in attempt to meet accreditation standards and improve the quality of patient care. Clinical training constitute a major part of the pre-doctoral dental education curriculum. In their clinical training, the students perform dental procedures on patients under the supervision of experienced faculty members. In clinical training, teaching and learning intersect with service provision. The factors that affect the quality of the students' learning and the factors that affect the quality of the services provided to the patients intertwine. An assessment of the quality of the clinical training programme was conducted using a mixed methods approach. We sought input from the faculty members, the dental students and their patients on several dimensions to evaluate the quality of the clinical training programme. Findings advise the decision makers in their quality improvement and curricular reform efforts. It may be useful to dental schools in other developing countries and to those interested in the quality of dental education and the quality of patient care in dental schools worldwide.