Postdoctoral Training in General, Pediatric and Public Health Dentistry and Dental Hygiene - Healthcare Network’s new Advance Education in Pediatric Dentistry (AEPD) Program will begin training residents in the 2025 academic year. The program is accredited by the Council on Dental Accreditation (CODA). The two primary training locations for the program are located in low-income, underserved, high needs areas of Collier County, Florida. Collier is designated both as a Medically Underserved area and Health Professional Shortage Area. The training sites include Healthcare Network’s Dental Care East, in the rural area of Immokalee, and Nichols Dental Care Center in Golden Gate. Approximately 28,000 residents live in Immokalee, and 36,000 in the Golden Gate community. Approximately half of the residents in each community are children. The majority of the residents in each community are Hispanic or Black (mostly Haitian), and English is not their first language. Many are also migrant or seasonal farmworkers. Recruitment of residents will focus on those from rural, disadvantaged backgrounds and those from underrepresented populations. The two-year training program will host four residents in its first year, with an additional four residents per year during years two through five of the Postdoctoral training grant, with a total of twenty residents trained by the end of the project period. Healthcare Network will track and report residents one year post program completion to determine the extent to which they practice in rural or underserved communities. Healthcare Network requests funding priorities for Priority 1: Collaborative Project and Priority 6: Cultural Competency and Oral Health Literacy
