Orthodontics Residency Personal Statement

Orthodontics Residency Personal Statement

I hope to be selected for a residency position in Orthodontics. In addition to being a native speaker of English, I am also fully fluent in Ukrainian and French, intermediate in German, and can get by in Italian. I was born in Rochester MN where my parents were doctors on staff at the Mayo Clinic. I attended private international schools because of my parent's appreciation for diversity. My best friend in grade school was Iranian. My other close friends were Japanese, Taiwanese, Indians, African Americans, and European Jews. A career in oral health has been my dream since adolescence and I am a natural fit with Global Dentistry. I finished dental school at the University of Missouri in 2022. My special passion, even before dental school, has always been Orthodontics, the field in which I have spent years of my free time reading voraciously.

I was deeply disappointed that my third and fourth years of dental school coincided with the COVID-19 Pandemic which resulted in our receiving much less opportunity for clinical experience due to a host of factors, primarily the distancing requirements that cut our capacity to less than half that of pre-pandemic levels. Hence, rather than applying to enter an Orthodontics residency program right after dental school, I decided to apply for an AEGD residency, and I am now in my second year. Since I began, I have excelled at time management and have become adept at coordinating with different specialists to provide interdisciplinary care. I am thankful for this opportunity to hone my clinical decision-making and diagnostic skills.

I date my passion for dentistry from a middle school career day when my classmate’s dad came to speak to our class about being a dentist. I came home that day announcing that I wanted to be a dentist. I was reminded of that day when I needed emergency dental care while working as an au pair in Germany. When I returned to Kansas City, I set about making my dream of becoming a dentist a reality. After only a few weeks of shadowing my family dentist’s successor (who completed a general practice residency), he offered me a job as a dental assistant. It was not long before I became the lead assistant in the practice.

At UMKC School of Dentistry, I immersed myself in every opportunity available. I was selected to take part in a small Denture Pilot Program, in which a small group of students were able to work in pairs to each complete an arch of complete dentures for a clinical patient in our D2 year. In my third year, I served as a TA for the preclinical Occlusion & Introduction to Fixed Prosthodontics Lab. I found it particularly rewarding to help friends and other classmates in the clinic who frequently sought me out with questions regarding lab work related to patient cases. Having noticed this, my faculty asked me to be a teaching assistant in the upcoming preclinical Complete Removable Prosthodontics Lab. My faculty also allowed me to perform an apically positioned flap surgery as a D3 for a patient in need when a 4th -year Periodontal Honors student was absent. I earned first place along with my partner in the D3 Grand Rounds Poster Presentation Contest. I was awarded the Dr. Robert and Lucille Cowan Scholarship because of my academic standing and was accepted into the Advanced Studies Program in Restorative Clinical Sciences.

My time growing up abroad in Switzerland, Ukraine, and Germany, and learning French, German, and Ukrainian, started paying off while still in dental school, translating for the patients of my peers. My expertise in silversmithing projects gave me an edge in hand skills, especially carving anatomy into amalgam restorations and arranging individual teeth for complete dentures. As a dental assistant, I quickly felt comfortable navigating OpenDental and Apteryx software, which made using AxiUm and MiPACS at UMKC easy.

As I move forward in my dental career, my goals are to always strive for excellence, advocate for my patient’s best interests, and engage in lifelong learning. I hope to open a small private orthodontics practice in my community and become a local leader in my profession. I also plan to treat almost exclusively children on Medicaid as well as volunteer at least one full day a week to help the children of uninsured families. I believe that my experiences so far, together with completing a residency in orthodontics, will prepare me to make major contributions to helping the underserved and uninsured in my area to receive orthodontic treatment.

Thank you for considering my application to your program.

Orthodontics Residency Personal Statement