– We are worried that we will not get enough training and experience. Sofie Marlen Mathisen says so. She is a dental student in her fifth year at UiT Norway’s Arctic University. – We really should have had more patients to practice on. Dental student Sofie Marlen Mathisen Photo: Rebekka Ellingsen / news 20 years ago the university started dental studies in Tromsø. Since then, they have trained several hundred dentists. These students have been dependent on patients in order to obtain authorization as a dentist. Sofie Marlen Mathisen wishes she had more patients to practice on. Photo: Rebekka Ellingsen / news The University Dental Clinic offers several of the same treatments as a regular dentist. The price you pay with students is half the price of a regular dentist. There is also always a dentist who evaluates the students and monitors what they are doing. – It takes a little longer, but there are nice students and a lot of “small talk”, says the student. Has become more difficult in recent years Ida Klaudiussen is a dentist and supervisor at the University Dental Clinic. She is happy that people’s dental health has improved, but: – For those of us who work to train new dental hygienists and dentists, it is not so good. In the last seven or eight years, it has only become more and more difficult to get hold of patients, according to the dentist. – I have many students who are worried that they won’t be able to do what they need to do before they finish their studies. Ida Klaudiussen is a dentist and supervisor at the University Dental Clinic at UiT. Photo: Rebekka Ellingsen / news The dentist says that they occasionally have to let three students go together for certain treatments, because the treatments are so rare. But there is much they would like to do more of. – Root canals, crowns, bridges and people who are going to pull teeth – everything that is a bit difficult. Sees the same tendency in Oslo and Bergen Heming Olsen-Bergem, president of the Norwegian Dental Association, estimates that around 80 percent of the population has good oral health. We are still not among the countries with the best oral health in Europe. Some of it is about people who can’t afford to go to the dentist, people who have acid damage from energy drinks and people who smoke. The same thing that happens at the University Dental Clinic in Tromsø, they have also seen in Bergen and Oslo, according to Olsen-Bergem. – Part of the explanation may be that we have an accumulation of dentists around the study sites. There are more dentists per inhabitant there than in the districts. Heming Olsen-Bergem, president of the Norwegian Dental Association. Photo: KRISTIN AKSNES – At the same time, we know that those who need it most do not go to the dentist. Those who have no rights in the public dental health system, with reduced purchasing power and low finances. He also believes that the opposite is true: that dental health will deteriorate in the future. Acid damage to teeth, for example, he believes we will see more of in a couple of years. The students stay in the north The dental student says that many of those who study to become dentists choose to stay in the north. – But the shortage of dentists and dental hygienists has not gone away. Especially in the districts of Finnmark, but also here in Troms, there are still recruitment problems, says Mathisen. Dental student Sofie Marlen Mathisen checks the teeth of fellow student Ingeborg Stuland Tysvær. Photo: Rebekka Ellingsen / news This autumn is Mathisen’s fifth at the university. She and the others have already managed to get regular patients. – We had a man who was well into his 90s, who was a regular patient with us. I remember him well! Published 15.09.2024, at 07.59
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Zero cavities cause toothache for future dentists – news Troms and Finnmark
