INDIA: 'Exponential growth in dental education'

MANGALORE, Karnataka (The Economic Times), November 16, 2007: Dental education in India has shown an exponential growth in the last two decades, with the number of dental institutions growing 10 times and over 23,000 dentists graduating every year, a top official of the International Association of Dental Research (IADR) said on Friday. "This makes Indian dental manpower one of the largest in the world. India should be occupying a leading position in dental education and research," Jocelnye Fiene, chairman of IADR said here. However, dental research in India has not yet shown its full potential, obvious from the low proportion of published research in international journals, she said. Motivated by these concerns, some dental researchers have been meeting with Indian universities over the last two years to initiate and promote research collaboration. The aim was to establish relationships with high calibre dental facilities, mutually exchange knowledge, explore possibilities of and help research collaboration and to offer support and training in research related activities, methodology, publishing and funding, she said. The barriers to cross-national research collaboration are mainly cultural differences in research expectations, difficulties in funding support and discordance in research standards, she said. International funding is virtually non-existent for collaborations with Indian dental schools, with most of it being through national research councils. There is stiff competition for them, Feine added. It is well recognised that there is little harmony in the levels of research standards between countries. Unless international standards are built in from the beginning, there is a reduced chance the research will be accepted internationally, she said. Copyright © 2007 Times Internet Limited.