Dental Tribune United Kingdom Edition

Time to brush the dust off the laptop ‘I think the Christ- mas port must have deleted the part of my brain which studied that in November!’ January 24-30, 20118 MSc Blog United Kingdom Edition Two of the UK’s most respected education and academic organisations have joined forces to provide an innovative, technology driven MSc in Restorative and Aesthetic Dentistry. Smile-on, the UK’s pre-eminent healthcare education provider and the University of Manchester, one of the top twenty-five universities in the world, have had the prescience to collaborate in providing students with the best of everything – lecturers, online technology, live sessions and support. The programme is designed to encour- age the student to take responsibility for his/her own learning. The emphasis is on a self-directed learning approach. The majority of the learning resources on this programme will be online. The masters will combine interactive distance learning, webinars, live learn- ing and print. Students will be able to communicate with a diverse multi-ethnic global community of peers, with who they will also share residen- tial get-togethers in fantastic settings around the world. Online Face to Face Hands-on Together This innovative pro- gramme establishes the academic and clinical parameters and standards for restor- ative and aesthetic dentistry. Students will leave with a world recognised MSc. Convenience Ownership Community Opportunity The World’s First Online MSc in Restorative & Aesthetic Dentistry Call Smile-on to find out more: tel: 020 7400 8989 email: info@smile-on.com web: www.smile-on.com/msc T his will be my short- est blog to date as it is currently the 3rd Janu- ary and I am coming out of the post-Christmas haze with the stark realisation of the amount of work I need to cover before the next two deadlines of 17th January and 28th January. The scene at the moment as I have plugged in my laptop to finally face-up to the detail of what I need to accomplish, is that I have a three year old asking me to put the skirts on her Playmobile princesses and a nine year old piano practice to lull me into concentration mode. And it is snowing AGAIN – although not badly, but still a good motiva- tion to stay inside! So, we have the final as- signment of our clinical re- search module to complete. This involves composing a re- search question, designing a structured search using terms such as Boolean Operators and MeSH terms – I’ll definitely need to refer back to my notes as I think the Christmas port must have deleted the part of my brain which studied that in No- vember! What research ques- tion will I come up with? Some- thing to do with bonding I think, maybe even direct dentine bonding as I am such a Magne disciple (or is it groupie?). Or I could do something on bacterial testing in perio? The dilemmas continue... somewhere along the line I have to discuss rel- evant outcome measures and ethical issues so maybe I should start from there and work back? Oh help... Then there are the final six clinical case studies for mod- ule three. I have at least been organised enough to have the cases ready with all the pho- tos uploaded (this takes forever in itself – I’m sure Smile-On will improve this platform for future students) – I only (!) need to write up the case re- ports – ooops, not quite, I’ve got five but I still need to find someone who needs complex whitening – know anyone with tetracycline staining in Perth? Send them along to me....! So, Endnote references at the ready – here I go... Nothing like starting the New Year with a healthy dose of stress!! DT Living in the post-Christmas haze Elaine Halley provides us with an MSc update About the author Elaine Halley BDS DGDP (UK) is the BACD Immediate Past President and the principal of Cherrybank Dental Spa, a private prac- tice in Perth. She is an active member of the AACD and her main interest is cosmetic and ad- vanced restorative dentistry and she has studied extensively in the United States, Europe and the UK.