Dental Residency Programs in Pennsylvania

Thanks to two major dental schools and a wide range of health systems, Pennsylvania offers dental graduates dental residency programs in a variety of specialty topics and practice settings. Offerings range from primary care training such as general dentistry or pediatric dentistry to specialized training experiences like endodontics or periodontic prosthetic training.

University of Pittsburgh

• The University of Pittsburgh's dental school offers residency training programs in 10 specialty areas, ranging from general dental practice, dental anesthesiology and endodontics to periodontics and oral and maxillofacial surgery. Training programs range in length from two to six years, depending on the topic and level of specialization. Dental graduates interested in applying to a residency program at the University of Pittsburgh may use one of two application methods, depending on the specialty area. Almost all topical areas use the Postdoctoral Application Support Service (PASS), an online matching service hosted by the American Dental Education Association. Five of the specialty programs offer students the option to use the self-managed method, where students compile an application package with all necessary credentials and send it in to the dental school. Although curricula for each of the specialty areas varies based on topic, University of Pittsburgh's dental school mandates a core curriculum for all training programs that features topics such as infection control, hospital protocols, applied head and neck anatomy, and research methodology.

  University of Pittsburgh
  Office of Residency Education
  School of Dental Medicine
  Room 440 Salk Hall
  Pittsburgh, PA 15261
  412-648-8406
  dental.pitt.edu

University of Pennsylvania

• The University of Pennsylvania's dental school offers dental residency programs in eight specialty areas. Postgraduate dental students can undergo specialty residency training in endodontics, oral medicine, oral and maxillofacial surgery, orthodontics, pediatric dentistry, periodontics, a combined program of periodontics and orthodontics, or a periodontic prosthesis program. Students may spend as little as two years in a residency program, or as long as six years, depending on the subject matter and the level of specialization. Dental school graduates who wish to apply to the University of Pennsylvania's dental residency programs may use either the Postdoctoral Application Support Service (PASS) or the dental match system for all its training programs.

  University of Pennsylvania
  School of Dental Medicine
  240 South 40th Street
  Philadelphia, PA 19104
  215-898-8965
  dental.upenn.edu

St. Luke's Dental Residency Program

• St. Luke's Hospital and Health System, a comprehensive health system in and around the Lehigh Valley area of Pennsylvania, offers a one-year general dentistry residency that trains dental graduates in comprehensive primary care. St. Luke's promises clinical and didactic experiences in general dentistry, restorative dentistry, orthodontics, pediatric dentistry, periodontics, and endodontics. Residents also perform clinical rotations in the hospital in anesthesiology, emergency medicine, family medicine, and community health. St. Luke's dental residency program allows applicants to use the Postdoctoral Application Support Service (PASS), national dental match, or the self-managed application process--but the hospital notes that there are only three slots in its residency program, making it very competitive.

  St. Luke's Dental Residency Program
  240 Union Station Plaza
  Bethlehem, PA 18015
  877-610-6161
  slhn-lehighvalley.org