NSU CDM Lasting Impressions Fall 2018

NOVA SOUTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY | 39 FAST FACTS GREAT EXPRESSIONS DENTAL CENTERS • headquartered in Michigan; founded in 1982 • industry leader in preventive dental care, orthodontics, and specialty care • 500 licensed dentists • 280 independently owned and operated offices in 10 states • recognized for oral health improvement initiatives addressing quality, safety, afford- ability, patient convenience, and research • donated $125,000 over five years to the NSU College of Dental Medicine • donates 5 percent of its revenue to various funds affiliated with Martin Luther King, Jr., organizations • makes more than 100,000 meals for Feeding Children Everywhere • hosts dental care missions to Haiti and Africa • provides oral-care products to communities via the GEDC SmileCenter in their shoes,” she said. “It makes it easy to explain things, because I’ve gone through all of the stages of teething, exfoliation, and trauma.” She regards patients as extended family. She has been treating many of them since she got out of residency and is now seeing them go off to college. She also is assisting the next generation of pediatric dentists. Several CDM dental students interested in pediatric dentistry shadow Yap Starkman on Saturdays to learn what her job entails. Jeffrey Starkman noted he “fell in love with compre- hensive care dentistry” while at the CDM and chose periodontics because of the college’s strong periodontal department. “That’s where the comprehensive treat- ment was,” he said. “In clinic, you learned how to put one crown here, one crown there, but the periodontal faculty members pieced it all together.” Assisting postgraduate students and learning dental theories about comprehensive care, as well as the excite- ment of being around motivated people, helped Jeffrey Starkman cement his future in the specialty. “Dental school is a rigorous four years, but it’s not nearly enough to know everything,” he said. “Once you master your craft, you throw in the dynamic proper- ties of working with patients and their time, budgets, desires, motivations—and explaining the value of what we do to them.” Yap Starkman added “the culmination of [dental school] was specializing. Now that we are specialists, I know it takes a team effort. That team effort is very apparent in a dental service organization, because I don’t have to look at other referral services. They are right there—sometimes literally in our office—so it’s so much easier.” “We want to see not only the patient, but the patient’s family, children, and the grandchildren,” Jeffrey Starkman added. “With that in mind, we have all aspects of dentistry covered: pediatric dentistry, orthodontics, general practitioner, and periodontics.” Yap Starkman’s advice to dental students is to embrace perseverance. “You have to believe in it,” she said. “To this day, I’m still close to my attendings and colleagues from residency, just because we were in it for the same intentions.” The two return to the CDM a few times each year to speak to American Student Dental Association members or present a program on career paths. u