The Dental Council of Hong Kong bit back after criticism by the former dean of the city’s only dentistry school. The council said in a four-page statement that it wanted to “clarify the facts and set the record straight” to maintain public confidence in the city’s dental profession. “[The] requirements of clinical experience are not unilaterally or arbitrarily imposed by the council, but rather were developed in consultation with the faculty,” it explained.
The council added that the process took into account overseas literature, experience and accreditation rules in a variety of jurisdictions, as well as the design of the Hong Kong curriculum, to “ensure the requirements would be achievable”. The 2019 changes included the need for dental students to have treated at least 50 patients of five different types, and perform minimum numbers in 20 types of dental procedures before they were qualified to work in the city. But Flemmig questioned if the added requirements accurately reflected the students’ competence.
The council, however, said the accreditation requirements involved quality and quantity, which were “contradictory to the quoted remarks as reported in media coverage”. “The quantitative requirement of clinical experience is not the only assessment criterion in the accreditation exercise,” it added. The training of dentists came under the spotlight in April after the government proposed one-year internships for city graduates to boost their clin.
