Lasting Impressions | Winter 2014

6 x LASTING IMPRESSIONS You are an advocate for public health. What do you see as NSU’s role in the area of dental public health? NSU’s College of Dental Medicine was founded based on the need for oral health care in various populations in South Florida. The American Dental Association’s Health Policy Research Institute has done some excellent research identifying the change in the use of dental services in the U.S. population since the economic recession of 2008. Of particular interest, they identified that, while more children are receiving dental care through Medicaid or State Children’s Health Insurance Pro- grams, more low-income adults are being disen- franchised from receiving dental care. NSU’s College of Dental Medicine has a long- standing commitment to providing dental care to underserved and special needs populations. We need to continue that commitment. Our students continue to have rotations at community locations that provide dental care for patients with HIV, for children who are both healthy and medically com- plex, and at the Henry Schein Special Needs Clini- cal Suite. Our students learn to care for medically and physically complex patients. As graduates, they continue to provide care to these patients. As a dental professional, you have worked with veterans at Veterans Affairs Medical Centers throughout Texas and Maryland. What chal- lenges are there in working with veterans? Throughout my clinical career, I have served as a hospital dentist. I liked practicing dentistry in this environment, both in the U.S. Public Health Service Division of Indian Health in Talihina, Oklahoma, where I started my career, and at several VA Medical Centers in Massachusetts, Maryland, and Texas. Caring for these patients often required com- plex decision making. More important, these posi- tions regularly demonstrated the important role dentistry plays in improving a patient’s overall health, not to mention, the clear relationship between systemic and oral health. Please tell us a little bit about your personal life. I grew up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; attended college at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque; and attended dental school at the Harvard School of Dental Medicine. After gradua- tion from dental school, I joined the U.S. Public Health Service to work with the Choctaw Nation, where I continued to learn about our Native Amer- ican culture and history. As chief of the Dental Service at the Talihina Indian Hospital, I learned early about the importance of being part of the medical team and the contributions that dental professionals can make to improve patients’ health. My physician husband and I met when we worked together on the medical staff at the Tali- hina Indian Hospital. We raised two sons, of whom we are incredibly proud. Our older son is an ear, nose, and throat surgeon who currently practices in Santa Rosa, California. He and his wife have two darling, intelligent, sweet children—Liam, who’s two years, and Nieve, who’s nine months. (Can you tell I’m a proud grandmother?) Our second son is a dentist; he is currently in the third year of a six- year oral and maxillofacial surgery residency at the University of Missouri in Kansas City. ◆ Researcher Umadevi Kandalam conducts an experiment. Research is central to NSU’s College of Dental Medicine and is mentioned in its vision and mission statements.