Letter from the Chair
Dear Friends, Colleagues and Alumni,
As the summer is coming to an end, we in the Department of Periodontics send you warm greetings and wishes for happiness and health, as the autumn season emerges.
As the Department Chair since 2011, I would like to take this opportunity, together with our program director, Mira Ghaly, to update you on the recent activities of the Department and the Advanced Education in Periodontics (AEIP) program.
First of all, if you wish to give directly to the Periodontics department, we have now established a Periodontics Giving Page through which you can view pictures of our residents and some of our recent initiatives. It also makes it convenient for you to give back to the profession, support several of the department's initiatives and promote and improve graduate education.
As many of you know, Phil Hanes retired last year after a long and illustrious career as department chair and then, as Academic Dean. In his honor we have established the Phil Hanes Lectureship. Every year we invite a distinguished speaker, a practicing periodontist from around the country,to present this lectureship, after which they receive a plaque and an honorarium. They spend the day speaking with our residents and those of the Ft. Gordon program and then enjoy graduation dinner at a local restaurant with our residents and faculty. The list of past Phil Hanes lecturers is posted in our conference room, and includes: Ed Rosenberg (2011), Cy Evian (2012), Ulf Wikesjo (2015), Thomas Van Dyke (2014), Henry Salama (2015), Robert Faiella (2016), Myron Nevins (2017), Purinima Kumar (2018), and Jeffery Ganeles (2019). We are now looking into providing CE credit for this lecture series, to better serve our alumni.
To mention some other major leadership changes in our department, Jamie Destefano,who received her DMD from MCG in 2001 and her certificate from the AEIP program in 2011, was appointed pre-doctoral director in 2015 after Pat Basquill retired. Dr. De Stefano's leadership has been instrumental in the success of our CODA accreditation site visit, in which we passed with flying colors.
The other major leadership change was that Kobi Stern stepped down from the Graduate Program Director position, of which he served for seven years. Mark Peacock was appointed to this very important position. Mark graduated from Augusta College and the MCG. He is specialty trained in the USArmy at Ft. Gordon/Eisenhower Army Medical Center, GA, has been a periodontist for 25 years, and board certified for 23 of those years. Pulling from his vast experience, Mark, together with our administrative staff, got us through a successful CODA accreditation site visit this past March.
As of August 1, 2019, we welcomed Mira Ghaly as the new Graduate Program Director. She obtained her dental degree from Universite de Montreal, did a GPR residency with McGill University, and practiced as a general dentist for several years before completing her MS and Periodontics education at Baylor College of Dentistry-TAMUS in 2007. She is both a fellow of the Royal College of Dentists of Canada and a diplomate of the American Board of Periodontology since 2007. After 9 years in private practice, she joined the DCG Periodontics faculty in July 2016 and is looking forward to this new and exciting opportunity. Cristiano Susin, who graduated from our program in 2011, and has been on our faculty since, was appointed Chair of Periodontics at UNG-Chapel Hill in 2018.
We also welcome two new faculty, Ahmed Elawady (DCG periodontics alumni, Balint Orban winner 2015) and Collins Lyons, who will bejoining us in November, 2019.
We currently have a total of 11 residents in the AEIP program, including two residents in the new combined PhD Periodontics certificate program.
Some of the more prominent initiatives, activities and awards, in the department are as follows:
- Alumni Photos of all the periodontics alumni have been converted to thumbnail photos, assembled and framed on the wall opposite the Chairs office.
- Digital guided implant The department has purchased a 3D- printer for in-house printing of surgical guides. Roger Arce, the Assistant Program Director and director of resident research, is leading this digitally-guided implant surgery initiative.
- Annual AAP-DCG reception/department A traditional annual gathering of our department's faculty, residents and alumni where we visit, recognize and celebrate our progress and achievements.
- Carlos and Marguerite Mason Trust Foundation to improve kidney transplant outcomes in the State of This 4-year foundation grant was awarded in 2018 to the department of periodontics, to develop, in collaboration with the Solid Organ Transplant Center at AU-Health, a dental intervention program and research program, to investigate the links between periodontal disease and chronic kidney disease and transplant failure.
- AAP Foundation & Research awards were bestowed on some of our recent graduates and faculty among which include the ADEA EDUCATION AWARD, PENNEL RESEARCH AWARD, VOLPE RESEARCH AWARD, and BALINT ORBAN AWARD.
Finally, we encourage you to stay in touch and consider contributing to our teaching efforts. We thank you for being an ambassador of the department of Periodontics at AU and we appreciate your past and future support of our graduate program. And of course, we wish you and your families a good start to the school year for those who have children and a safe and enjoyable fall to all!
With Warm Regards,
Christopher W. Cutler, DDS, PhD Professor and Chair
Diplomate American Board of Periodontology
Dept. of Periodontics
Dental College of Georgia
Mira Ghaly, DMD, MS
Assistant Professor and Graduate Program Director
Diplomate American Board of Periodontology
Dept. of Periodontics
Dental College of Georgia