The Oral Health Section of the American Public Health Association is pleased to announce the 2008 recipients of The Anthony Westwater Jong Memorial Community Dental Health Pre-Professional Awards sponsored by Colgate Oral Pharmaceuticals and The Anthony Westwater Jong Memorial Community Dental Health Post-professional Award sponsored by OMNI Preventive Care, A 3M ESPE Company. The awards were established in 2006 in memory of the late Anthony Westwater Jong and in recognition of his commitment to community-based dental public health, his strong and highly acclaimed mentoring of students, and his emphasis on the importance of state, local and community based public health action.
Anthony Westwater Jong Memorial Community Dental Public Health Pre-Professional Awards
Betsy Mae Preheim, RDH
Betsy is a recent graduate of the Dental Hygiene Program at Clark College in Vancouver, Washington. After graduating from high school in 2000, Betsy spent four years in the Air Force working on computers. During her enlistment she was deployed to Kuwait (02) and Iraq (04). Betsy decided to pursue a career in dental hygiene because she loves to help people. She became interested in the homeless population of Clark County and the oral health issues they faced while enrolled in a Dental Public Health class. After conducting a needs assessment and an access-to-care survey, Betsy took the lead, collaborated with community partners and organized and facilitated a dental health day that provided over $20,000 worth of dental services to homeless men. Betsy believes an important element of public health is reducing health disparities for the underserved and hopes to continue in this field upon graduation.
Adrienne Archidiacono, DMD 2009
Adrienne is a fourth year dental student at Boston University Goldman School of Dental Medicine. As a first year student Adrienne became involved in BU’s American Student Dental Association, serving as its Community Outreach Chair. From the start, Adrienne began planning local community health projects, which have grown every year under her leadership. This past year, Adrienne expanded an oral health promotion program at a local Boys and Girls Club to include a club-based oral health education, sealant and fluoride program. Adrienne’s involvement in community health dentistry has lead to the realization that there is so much more to dentistry than clinical-based procedures. Adrienne wants to take her career beyond the scope of the operatory through program planning and implementation in order to make and help to make impact in improving oral health care at a local and national level.
Maciek Dolata, DDS 2010
Maciek is a third year student at The University of Michigan School of Dentistry. Maciek has displayed a keen passion for oral public health from the beginning. Specifically, he is interested in the way dental services are provided to underserved populations and mechanisms to improve their delivery through greater efficiency, effectiveness, and better quality. Maciek played a leading role in every aspect of a study that investigated the current status and operation of community dental clinics in the State of Michigan, an effort for which he won a first prize in a student research competition. Maciek plans to continue to widen his knowledge, skills, and understanding of public health and use his passion to make more contributions to the field of public health as well as improve the oral health status of the public.
Anthony Westwater Jong Memorial Community Dental Public Health Post-Professional Award
Daniel Saman, MPH
A recent graduate of the University of Kentucky College Of Public Health, Daniel is a research assistant at the Division of Dental Public Health at the University of Kentucky, College of Dentistry. As part of his capstone project, Daniel conducted a Geographic Information System (GIS) analysis of the distribution of licensed dentists across rural, urban and Appalachian Kentucky. The outcome of his project resulted in a better understanding of the distribution of dentists across the Commonwealth. Daniel plans to attend dental school and then practice in the Appalachian Kentucky, a place with severe unmet dental needs. In the future he plans to be instrumental in the development of policies and programs that may result in improvements in access and availability to oral health care.