The Department of Oral Health Policy and Epidemiology is dedicated to training epidemiologists and public health dentists to work within interdisciplinary teams to conduct investigations on the risk factors for oral disease, their relation to systemic disease, and on the use of oral epidemiological methods to study health outcomes of dental services and oral health policy.
 

The Department is providing integrated training in three focus areas of 1) molecular epidemiology of oral disease, 2) epidemiology of oral and systemic disease, and 3) evidence-based dentistry.

History

Over the past 16 years the program has become increasingly interdisciplinary.  Strong collaborative relationships have been established between HSDM, several departments at HSPH and with institutions and agencies that offer a wide variety of training sites.  These sites include Forsyth Institute, the Sloan Institute at Boston University, New England Research Institute, Cambridge Health Alliance, the Harvard Affiliated Hospitals , Channing Labs, the MA Dept. Of Health and the Harvard Pilgrim Health Plan.  We have successfully trained masters and doctoral students in interdisciplinary research and our trainees routinely progress to become funded researchers and leaders in Dentistry, Industry, and Dental Education.