About the Area Seminars on Oral Disease |
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The Area Seminars on Oral
Disease were begun in 1978 by the Department of Oral Pathology of the West
Virginia University School of Dentistry. They were initiated as a
response to a request from Dean Biddington that all departments in the
school provide outreach education to the school's alumni and other
dentists in the state. Monthly seminars were offered in Charleston,
Clarksburg and Martinsburg through the Charleston Area Medical Center and
the VA hospitals in Clarksburg and Martinsburg. From their inception
the Seminars were also The seminars are participation discussions of clinical cases, with participants being provided "notebook cases" a month ahead of time, with appropriate photos, historical and clinical information provided. Participants are expected to come to the next seminar with a differential diagnosis, a diagnostic work-up plan and a management plan for each case. They are called upon individually and treat the cases, as best they can within the limits of the format, as their own patients. From time to time special topics are provided in a more traditional lecture format, and these may carry over several seminars. As of June, 2000, there had been discussion of more than 1230 clinical cases (about 1/6 were repeat cases). *ACS logo used with permission |
sponsored by the West Virginia Division of the
American Cancer Society (later the Mid-Atlantic Division, which
incorporates 4 states and Washington, D.C.).* The Martinsburg
seminars lasted for 12 years and the Charleston seminars lasted for 16
years. The Clarksburg seminars have met continuously since March,
1978 and together constitute, as near as we can determine, the
longest-running continuous education course in dentistry today.
During this entire time the Clarksburg VA Hospital has been a gracious and
kind host to the seminar participants and organizers.