Entering dental school, each student is expected to acquire many faces. We become masters of manual dexterity, champions of clinical reasoning, and deft at detecting disease. Our skills are underlined by our ultimate role as professionals, serving the community as a face of clinical expertise, guidance and trust. Fresh out of sixth form, learning to live independently for the first time in a new city, and adjusting to university education, this can certainly be a big challenge to face. Even in my fourth year, I still find it difficult to juggle the professional responsibilities existing in the space between lectures, seminars and clinical activity.
A general dental practitioner has a vast range of competencies, so, naturally, these are exposed as separate entities along the undergraduate journey. It is both exciting and daunting approaching each academic year with the knowledge of experiencing a completely new clinical environment. In our first year, this was a cushioned entry into patient clinics; in second year we began to learn skills of radiography; and three years in we were welcomed into the oral surgery department. In our fourth year, this was rounded off with paediatric dentistry and time shadowing on the orthodontics department.
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