For many years my reply to strangers asking “What is Seattle Study Club?” was to say, “we teach oral surgeons and periodontists how to run continuing dental education programs in their home towns for the general dentists they work with.” Of course, it’s much more than that but this 10 second explanation always generated a nod of understanding and sometimes an exclamatory “wow!” More recently, I was on a Symposium-planning conference call with Dr Lauralee Nygaard, Director of Meridian Dental Study Group in Spokane, WA, and out of her mouth came these words: “You know what Seattle Study Club is? It’s doing dentistry together!” I was so taken by how well this short phrase sums up the heart and soul of Seattle Study Club that I immediately asked Dr Nygaard if we could trademark it and she graciously said yes.
Seattle Study Club clinicians are doing dentistry together when they treatment plan cases as part of their local study club programming and when they collaborate on treatment to deliver the finest possible results to their mutual patients. And they are doing dentistry together when they participate in our annual SSC Symposium, learning not only from presentations delivered from the podium but also in small group discussions with their peers from around the US and the world. Even our study club members in China, confined to their homes due to the public health emergency, will be doing dentistry together next month when they watch Dr Chiche’s live online webinar on “All-Ceramics Systems Selection” with Dr Huan Huang, Director of Seattle Study Club of Beijing, translating. (This was not a regularly scheduled webinar but something Dr Chiche wanted to do for our SSC members in China so that they will know that our thoughts and prayers are with them.)
Of course, it’s not just our Seattle Study Club clinicians who are doing dentistry together. It’s also everyone working with and for them behind the scenes to support this multi-faceted educational mission to excel in diagnosis, comprehensive treatment planning, and the treatment rendered.
Doing Dentistry Together. That’s how we roll at Seattle Study Club.
