Article: Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery (OMFS) Registrar

[frootloop]

...it's the same idea. Society needs more rural and indigenous doctors, so we make sure enough of them get into medicine.

Society also needs oral and maxillofacial surgeons (who, by definition in NZ/Aus, are trained in both dentistry and medicine). So we make sure to let enough of them into medicine.

Medical admissions isn't just about 'fairness' to individual applicants. It's also about making sure the medical workforce meets society's needs.

[OFFTOPIC] I can't help myself, apparently [/OFFTOPIC]

 

[peterw]

Frootloop,

You never actually answered the question did you? You simple state heresay and what personally think. No facts at all. Here is an example " They SEEM TO BE pretty well accepted"
If they were in fact accepted by the other surgeons then they would have been accepted by the official body which is the College of Surgeons. That in fact clearly demonstrates that they ARE NOT accepted. So your statement is clearly false.


You and most of the other posters here ( who probably have a vested interest and thus a bias) have never been able to justify why this very small group of dental students get RESERVED places in medical school. No one has even attempted to justify it. Because there is no reason why they should. There is no reason why they could not apply LIKE EVERY OTHER STUDENT AND COMPETE ON AN EQUAL FOOTING.

 

[frootloop]

You and most of the other posters here ( who probably have a vested interest and thus a bias) have never been able to justify why this very small group of dental students get RESERVED places in medical school. No one has even attempted to justify it. Because there is no reason why they should. There is no reason why they could not apply LIKE EVERY OTHER STUDENT AND COMPETE ON AN EQUAL FOOTING.

Vested interest? Lolwhut? I'm a straight white male from a large city, and neither I nor anyone I care about is a dentist or OMFS. I'm about as far removed from the special entry categories as you can get haha.

I competed with everyone else on your precious 'even footing' and got in. And I'm telling you I completely agree with the special entry pathways - including dentistry lateral entry.

 

[peterw]

"Society also needs oral and maxillofacial surgeons (who, by definition in NZ/Aus, are trained in both dentistry and medicine). So we make sure to let enough of them into medicine"

Now YOU and I both know that has to be the weakest justification I have ever seen. Society need them, so we let them into medicine. Is that the best you can do? What an absolute joke.
This kind of weak excuse can be applied to just about anything.

 

[frootloop]

So you'd rather society just didn't have them? That's what you're telling me. 'Cause if we make it more difficult for dentists to get into medicine to start down the OMFS pathway, we'll get fewer of them.

And then I'll leave you to explain to patients needing OMFS services that some 18 year old had better UMAT grades than the dentist who applied, so it'll be a 2 year wait for their surgery.

 

[pi]

If they were in fact accepted by the other surgeons then they would have been accepted by the official body which is the College of Surgeons. That in fact clearly demonstrates that they ARE NOT accepted.

Who cares if they are not "surgeons" by your technical definition of the word? They share the same surgical theatres, the same scrub nurses and teams, the same change-rooms. Much like obstetricians and gynaecologists, and even some ophthalmologists: they do surgery, and therefore they are surgeons to me. Being in RACS or not is more of an administrative issue, not a qualification issue. If some other agency wants to take care of OMFS then I can't see anyone in RACS complaining to take that extra paperwork off their hands

 

[applecider]

@peterw Even if you don't like it posting on this forum will change nothing. Dentists will still be able to gain entrance into medicine via lateral entry and doctors will still be able to gain entrance into dentistry via lateral entry. It is just how the OMFS pathway works. The sun will still rise tomorrow and you will still be the person who picked a fight unprovoked on a topic no one but yourself seems to care about on a public forum.

 

[Ruth]

Peter, you seem to think it's very easy for a dentist to get into medicine and therefore become an OMFS. I won't pretend to know a lot about it, but I would imagine that as a dentist I probably know more than you. It is very very hard for a person to become an OMFS. You would have to have top grades in your BDS degree (and I would imagine that it's harder to achieve a high average over the 5 years it takes to get your BDS degree, with its very different assessments, then it would over the 3 years of a BSc with tests and exams). Then one has to get a hospital job after graduating which are very difficult and competitive to get. In order to specialise in NZ at least, you need to have participated in research, with at least 2 studies to your name.

There are 4 Australian universities which offer the maxfac course, and they take one person a year. That's 4 people a year getting lateral whatever into your precious medicine degree. ONE person at each of those FOUR respective universities. I highly doubt that is making much difference at all to medicine admissions, I'm sure one of the Aussies will be glad to tell you how many medicine students are accepted in Australia each year, but I'm pretty sure four people is not making a very big difference at all. In New Zealand, it's literally less than one a year.

 

[Mana]

"Society also needs oral and maxillofacial surgeons (who, by definition in NZ/Aus, are trained in both dentistry and medicine). So we make sure to let enough of them into medicine"

Now YOU and I both know that has to be the weakest justification I have ever seen. Society need them, so we let them into medicine. Is that the best you can do? What an absolute joke.
This kind of weak excuse can be applied to just about anything.

This is the entire rationale behind letting rural and indigenous applicants into medicine through separate quotas - it's not because those students were disadvantaged (though they were) - it's because there is a well documented workforce shortage of rural clinicians and an even more well documented workforce shortage of indigenous clinicians, and a very good evidence base that doctors with a rural background are much more likely to go back and practice rural (and same for indigenous doctors).

This is the strongest justification there is for setting aside positions in any training program - society needs them and therefore we train them to meet society's needs - and this takes high precedence over letting yet another year 12 student into medicine, which at the moment, Australian society certainly doesn't need another handful of.

 

[peterw]

That's absolutely ridiculous and you know it. Firstly much of that waiting list is caused by the OMFS themselves. You clearly understand very little. If the OMFS made the waiting list short no patient would elect to go private and pay thousands to have their teeth removed like an old fashioned dentist would have done. By keeping the waiting list long, dental patients are encouraged (or basically have very little option to deal with their pain but to go private and pay thousands to the dental specialist)
Secondly most of what OMFS does is pure dentistry, wisdom teeth. Many many of the OMFS will try to quickly move across to be doing what is traditionally done be the Surgeons ( mainly plastics) and leave their dental skills behind. Many I have spoken to have told me they believe they are superior to the plastic surgeons ( with absolutely no plastic training at all) and thus they should be doing just plastic surgery around the face. This is what they are really trying to achieve. They mostly want to deny their dental origins and pass themselves off as facial plastic surgeons. So again here, increasing the number of OMFS by as you say "allowing more in because society needs them" would do very little to relieve the waiting list. The dental specialists keep it as long as they can for their own benefit ( I admit this same reasoning equally applies to many of the surgical specialties as well, not just the dental specialists). Your assumption that increasing the number of dental specialists would shorten the waiting list is very very naive and clearly demonstrates you have very little understanding in this area.

 

[frootloop]

Paragraphs. Use them

 

[Ruth]

That's absolutely ridiculous and you know it. Firstly much of that waiting list is caused by the OMFS themselves. You clearly understand very little. If the OMFS made the waiting list short no patient would elect to go private and pay thousands to have their teeth removed like an old fashioned dentist would have done. By keeping the waiting list long, dental patients are encouraged (or basically have very little option to deal with their pain but to go private and pay thousands to the dental specialist)
Secondly most of what OMFS does is pure dentistry, wisdom teeth. Many many of the OMFS will try to quickly move across to be doing what is traditionally done be the Surgeons ( mainly plastics) and leave their dental skills behind. Many I have spoken to have told me they believe they are superior to the plastic surgeons ( with absolutely no plastic training at all) and thus they should be doing just plastic surgery around the face. This is what they are really trying to achieve. They mostly want to deny their dental origins and pass themselves off as facial plastic surgeons. So again here, increasing the number of OMFS by as you say "allowing more in because society needs them" would do very little to relieve the waiting list. The dental specialists keep it as long as they can for their own benefit ( I admit this same reasoning equally applies to many of the surgical specialties as well, not just the dental specialists). Your assumption that increasing the number of dental specialists would shorten the waiting list is very very naive and clearly demonstrates you have very little understanding in this area.

LOL DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT AN OMFS DOES

 

[Ruth]

THIS IS HILARIOUS

 

[Ruth]

Peter, you seem to have confused 'oral maxillofacial surgeon' with 'oral surgeon'. They are very, very, very different things.

An oral surgeon does not need to do a medicine degree. They primarily do extractions. You become an oral surgeon by specialising, eg. the DClinDent at Otago Uni.

An oral maxillofacial surgeon very rarely does extractions. They spend a lot of time in hospitals in the emergency department, and are in every sense of the word specialist surgeons of the entire head and neck. They are involved with facial reconstruction, surgeries required for eg. orthodontic reasons (eg. bilateral sagittal split osteotomies). They are who you call if a patient has a massive facial swelling or a life-threatening infection and you're not sure what to do, or a patient who has been in an accident or undergone serious trauma (eg. gunshot to the face). You do NOT waste an oral maxillofacial surgeon's time with tooth extraction.

 

[peterw]

Thanks for your answer Ruth.
However I have to disagree. Firstly its interesting that many on this forum have pointed out that I seem to be degrading dentistry as opposed to medicine. Many have stated that its equally difficult. However I note you Ruth, are only too willing to discard a science degree as being easier than a dental degree. Year for year, I really doubt that.
Secondly I never stated that it was " very easy" for a dentist to get into medicine. What I have stated all along is that it is easier than for any other graduate, even for an ordinary dental graduate not accepted into OMFS. It is still rather difficult. However with the reserved place in lateral entry it makes it much easier than it would be otherwise. Do the sums. There are thousands of students and graduates trying to get in via usual entry. With reserved places the ONLY people who can apply for the place its a dental student who has been accepted into OMFS training. IT makes it MUCH EASIER.
Lastly the fact that it is only happening on a small scale does not justify it. That argument just does not hold up. The fact that their are only a small number of people in Australia evading tax does not make it right. Do you think the tax department should just ignore them because they are only a small number. If someone holds up the bank, but only gets away with a small amount of cash, should we just let them go, its only a small number No Ruth, that is no justification.

 

[Mana]

That's absolutely ridiculous and you know it. Firstly much of that waiting list is caused by the OMFS themselves.

A long waiting list is a sign of a shortage of professionals in the specialty, not an oversupply of them. Try again.

You clearly understand very little. If the OMFS made the waiting list short no patient would elect to go private and pay thousands to have their teeth removed like an old fashioned dentist would have done. By keeping the waiting list long, dental patients are encouraged (or basically have very little option to deal with their pain but to go private and pay thousands to the dental specialist)

OMFS don't make the waiting list long on purpose; the list is long because of a shortage of professionals, as stated above. Furthermore, the difference between private and public is much more complex than just "the OMFS wants more money therefore they don't work 100% public" - there are other staff and other facilities involved as well, including theatre and anaesthetist availability.

Secondly most of what OMFS does is pure dentistry, wisdom teeth.

This probably shows how little you actually know about OMFS - see @Ruth's comment above

Many many of the OMFS will try to quickly move across to be doing what is traditionally done be the Surgeons ( mainly plastics) and leave their dental skills behind. Many I have spoken to have told me they believe they are superior to the plastic surgeons ( with absolutely no plastic training at all) and thus they should be doing just plastic surgery around the face. This is what they are really trying to achieve. They mostly want to deny their dental origins and pass themselves off as facial plastic surgeons. So again here, increasing the number of OMFS by as you say "allowing more in because society needs them" would do very little to relieve the waiting list. The dental specialists keep it as long as they can for their own benefit ( I admit this same reasoning equally applies to many of the surgical specialties as well, not just the dental specialists). Your assumption that increasing the number of dental specialists would shorten the waiting list is very very naive and clearly demonstrates you have very little understanding in this area.

I haven't said anywhere to increase the number of dental specialists or OMFS; I have said that for society's needs, the applicant who has been accepted to OMFS needs to be able to train (i.e. they need a spot in medical or dental school) or else we aren't going to have any OMFS to serve society. I'm all for having a handful fewer spots for year 12 applicants to get into medicine because they come out as junior doctors without advanced training, where the shortage is not there but in the amount of advanced specialties.

 

[Mana]

Thanks for your answer Ruth.
However I have to disagree. Firstly its interesting that many on this forum have pointed out that I seem to be degrading dentistry as opposed to medicine. Many have stated that its equally difficult. However I note you Ruth, are only too willing to discard a science degree as being easier than a dental degree. Year for year, I really doubt that.

LOL - Good luck trying to convince anyone that a 3 year bachelor level science degree is more difficult than a 5 year dental degree.

Secondly I never stated that it was " very easy" for a dentist to get into medicine. What I have stated all along is that it is easier than for any other graduate, even for an ordinary dental graduate not accepted into OMFS. It is still rather difficult. However with the reserved place in lateral entry it makes it much easier than it would be otherwise. Do the sums. There are thousands of students and graduates trying to get in via usual entry. With reserved places the ONLY people who can apply for the place its a dental student who has been accepted into OMFS training. IT makes it MUCH EASIER.

It's a lot harder for a medical or dental graduate to be accepted into OMFS than for any applicant to be accepted into medical or dental school; the difficult selection process has already occurred prior to them applying to medical school. Do the sums in terms of the number of people applying to OMFS compared to the number of people who actually get into it, instead of only looking at the ones who already made it in and seeing how many of them make it into medical school or dental school.

Lastly the fact that it is only happening on a small scale does not justify it. That argument just does not hold up. The fact that their are only a small number of people in Australia evading tax does not make it right. Do you think the tax department should just ignore them because they are only a small number. If someone holds up the bank, but only gets away with a small amount of cash, should we just let them go, its only a small number No Ruth, that is no justification.

Ruth hasn't said that the small scale is justifying it - the justification is that those people have already passed a much more stringent selection than any applicant has applying to medical or dental school, and if we were then to apply the normal medical or dental student selection to them via another interview, we'd end up with a further shortage of them on top of the current shortage we have.

 

[Ruth]

Thanks for your answer Ruth.
However I have to disagree. Firstly its interesting that many on this forum have pointed out that I seem to be degrading dentistry as opposed to medicine. Many have stated that its equally difficult. However I note you Ruth, are only too willing to discard a science degree as being easier than a dental degree. Year for year, I really doubt that.
Secondly I never stated that it was " very easy" for a dentist to get into medicine. What I have stated all along is that it is easier than for any other graduate, even for an ordinary dental graduate not accepted into OMFS. It is still rather difficult. However with the reserved place in lateral entry it makes it much easier than it would be otherwise. Do the sums. There are thousands of students and graduates trying to get in via usual entry. With reserved places the ONLY people who can apply for the place its a dental student who has been accepted into OMFS training. IT makes it MUCH EASIER.
Lastly the fact that it is only happening on a small scale does not justify it. That argument just does not hold up. The fact that their are only a small number of people in Australia evading tax does not make it right. Do you think the tax department should just ignore them because they are only a small number. If someone holds up the bank, but only gets away with a small amount of cash, should we just let them go, its only a small number No Ruth, that is no justification.

It is much harder to maintain a high GPA over 5 years then it is over 3 years - are you really refuting that?

Last year, my mark consisted of an OSCE, an oral exam, a clinical presentation of 3 patients and my treatment plans, including 3-4 marks per clinic, of which I had 5-6 a week. There was also a mark from my oral surgery rotation, a 6-weekly assessment from my 'mentor' and another 6-weekly assessment by my tutors, and my final exam. I would consider that harder to get a high grade in than your average paper in a BSc, of which you might have a terms test, lab marks, and a final exam.

4 dentists get into an OMFS program each year. 580 people graduate each year. And actually to use that figure downplays how hard it is to get in - because you're not only competing with people in your year, you're competing with people in EVERY year, and you're also competing with dentists from overseas. It is MUCH harder than getting into medicine. There may be 'thousands' of people trying to get into medicine usually, but there are also more than 4 places for those people. - over 3000 actually

 

[Ruth]

I think the fact that you're complaining about literally < 0.0013% of people getting into medicine each year shows this is about more than medicine entrance for you.

I wonder what your 'family of dentists' would think about your opinions.

 

[peterw]

Mana,

Ruth did in fact justify it on the grounds that is was a very small number. Read her post above. She states ...
"There are 4 Australian universities which offer the maxfac course, and they take one person a year. That's 4 people a year getting lateral whatever into your precious medicine degree. ONE person at each of those FOUR respective universities. I highly doubt that is making much difference at all to medicine admissions, I'm sure one of the Aussies will be glad to tell you how many medicine students are accepted in Australia each year, but I'm pretty sure four people is not making a very big difference at all. In New Zealand, it's literally less than one a year"


I actually never said a 3 year science degree was harder than a 5 year dental degree. What I did say was year for year I doubt the dental degree is any harder. In other words I doubt 2nd year dentistry is any harder than 2nd year science. Please get your facts right. By the way I have tutored a few dental students.