Dental Rotations and Didactics
About the Rotation Sites
The CHA Windsor Street Care Center is located in a multi-purpose community center at 119 Windsor Street in Cambridge. It is one of CHA's busiest care centers, serving a diverse, multicultural community.
Health care services provided include adult and pediatric primary care, mental health services and dentistry. The center serves as the primary site for outpatient dental care at CHA, with seven dental operatories and over 12,000 annual patient visits.
The Harvard Dental Center (HDC) is the clinical site of the General Practice Residency (GPR) program at Harvard School of Dental Medicine. It is located on the first floor at 188 Longwood Avenue in Boston.
This facility is also used by postdoctoral programs, letting residents practice side by side with world-renowned Harvard faculty. The HDC boasts 24 dental operatories, radiology, laboratory, sterilization area, reception area and business office.
About the Experience
Building on the clinical and academic strengths of CHA and Harvard School of Dental Medicine, this residency program integrates dental and medical training. By bridging the gap between these disciplines, the program prepares residents with the interdisciplinary knowledge required to practice as oral physicians within a complex healthcare system.
The CHA GPR curriculum features rotations in Medicine, Emergency Medicine, Anesthesia, and the Oral Physician Model. In these roles, residents collaborate with interprofessional teams to provide primary care and screenings, fostering an interdisciplinary understanding of the relationship between oral and systemic health.
Rotation Descriptions
Oral Physician Model: By combining patient histories with physical exams, residents develop diagnostic skills at CHA and Harvard-affiliated sites. The program’s curriculum bridges the medical-dental divide through the management of oral manifestations of systemic conditions. Residents gain critical experience analyzing how social drivers of health and medical interventions alter dental treatment plans, all while fostering a professional culture of sensitivity and inclusive care.
The residents participate in the following rotations:
ACTION Clinic: During this rotation, residents will develop professional leadership and educational mentorship skills by precepting predoctoral Harvard students in a community-based pediatric setting at Windsor Dental Clinic, attending 12 Saturday sessions during the year.
Anesthesia: The anesthesia rotation will provide residents with the opportunity to perform perioperative care to patients who require agents to prevent or relieve pain during procedures, to monitor and manage the airway of semi- or fully unconscious patients, to manage same-day surgery patients, and to provide care in the operating room. This is a two-week, full-time assignment.
Emergency Medicine: The goal of this rotation is for the resident to be able to perform an initial assessment to identify life-threatening conditions, accurately triage patients based on medical urgency, and assist in a detailed head-to-toe evaluation to stabilize patients presenting with acute illness or injury. This is a one-week, full-time assignment to one of the CHA emergency rooms with duties to be assigned by the designated emergency room physician.
Harvard Dental Center: The goal of this rotation is to develop clinical independence within a multi-specialty academic environment by mastering the ability to complete comprehensive consults, deliver accurate treatment plans, and manage interdisciplinary dental care.
Healthcare for the Homeless: Residents work alongside an interdisciplinary team of providers (physicians, nurse practitioners, social workers, community health workers) to deliver care in the community. The primary goal of this rotation is to conduct oral health screenings that facilitate care management and the establishment of a dental home.
Inpatient Child/Adolescent Psychiatry: Residents spend several days delivering oral health education to pediatric and adolescent patients during group sessions within the CHA Somerville inpatient psychiatric units.
Medicine: During this rotation, the resident will perform comprehensive medical evaluations and formulate a differential diagnosis for complex patients, effectively integrating multisource diagnostic data and specialist consultations to guide perioperative or systemic management.
On Call: The overall goal of the on-call rotation is to develop autonomous, medically resilient dental clinicians capable of triaging, diagnosing, and managing acute oral health emergencies and inpatient consultations.
Operating Room Dentistry: The primary goal of this rotation is to integrate clinical excellence with rigorous hospital protocols, specifically focusing on the preoperative evaluation of dental patients for general anesthesia suitability through thorough history and physical reviews. Residents will master intraoperative workflows, providing efficient, high-quality dental rehabilitation while coordinating effectively with the anesthesia and nursing teams.
Pediatric Dentistry: By the end of the rotation, the resident will be able to perform age-appropriate dental examinations and clinical procedures for pediatric patients, demonstrating proficiency in behavior guidance techniques and the delivery of comprehensive preventive and restorative care in a private practice setting.
Windsor Dental Clinic: The primary objective of this rotation is to bridge the gap between foundational skillsets and advanced clinical practice, empowering residents to function as effective oral physicians within an integrated healthcare system. By mastering complex restorative and surgical techniques and providing care for medically compromised populations, residents will achieve a high level of diagnostic and clinical excellence. Residents spend most of their time during residency at this clinic.
Patient Care Activities
Clinical Dental Services: Residents provide comprehensive and emergency dental care through rotations at two primary sites: the Windsor Street Care Center (six months total) and the Harvard Dental Center (three months total). These rotations are interspersed throughout the academic year under the supervision of full- and part-time Harvard School of Dental Medicine faculty.
Standard Clinical Hours:
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- Harvard Dental Center: 8:00 am – 12:00 pm and 1:00 pm – 5:00 pm
- Windsor Clinic: 8:30 am – 12:15 pm and 1:15 pm – 5:00 pm
Extended Hours: Open late on Mondays and select Saturdays
After Hours On-call Duty: Each resident is required to perform emergency first call duties for Cambridge Health Alliance hospitals on a rotational basis. Program faculty members provide second call service on a rotational basis as well.
Didactic Program
Our residency offers a rigorous, year-round didactic curriculum led by Harvard School of Dental Medicine faculty and respected guest lecturers. The program integrates clinical dentistry and medicine with practice management and public health to ensure a well-rounded professional foundation. These core concepts are reinforced through seminars, literature reviews, clinical rotations, and case presentations.
Overall Goals and Program Objectives
The General Practice Residency Program will:
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- General Dentistry: Train residents to act as primary care "oral physicians" with a focus on general dentistry by building upon their existing foundation to master advanced diagnosis, ethical decision-making, comprehensive treatment planning, and clinical knowledge and skills across operative dentistry, endodontics, periodontics, fixed and removable prosthodontics, oral surgery, and emergency dental services.
- Resident Education: Expand residents' knowledge and clinical expertise across key dental disciplines through a robust clinical and didactic curriculum, evidence-based dentistry, quality-improvement strategies, and the implementation of technology-based information systems (EHR, telehealth, and digital equipment) to foster lifelong learning.
- Patient Care: Enable residents to manage overall patient care needs through health promotion, disease prevention, diagnosis, risk assessment, and effective referral skills, ensuring coordinated, patient-centered care for diverse populations.
- Community Service: Empower residents to develop the skills, knowledge, and cultural humility required to deliver oral healthcare, health promotion, and public education outside the traditional clinics, meeting local community needs through health screenings, fairs, and/or street medicine.
- Hospital-Based Oral Health Care: Train residents to provide comprehensive oral health care in a hospital setting for diverse and medically, socially, and behaviorally complex patients by collaborating effectively with interdisciplinary medical teams to integrate dental treatment with patients’ overall healthcare needs.
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