About the Department

Welcome from the Chairman
John H. Unkel, DDS, MPA

Welcome to Virginia Commonwealth University’s Department of Pediatric Dentistry. We encourage you to navigate our Web site to appreciate our vision as well as our educational, clinical care and research ambitions. Whether you are a guardian seeking oral health care for your child, a health professional with a question, an alumnus desiring to be connected with the Department or a student searching for a potential residency program, we anticipate you will locate your objective on our site.

The vision of the Department of Pediatric Dentistry is unique - we focus on the oral health of the growing and developing child and how oral health impacts the overall health of the individual. Many of our nationally recognized faculty have subspecialty interests such as anesthesia, clinical care delivery, education, epidemiology, medicine and pharmacology to name a few which support our vision. These interests lend a multidisciplinary educational approach to prepare our students and residents for a rapidly evolving healthcare environment.

The Department of Pediatric Dentistry is committed to clinical excellence, innovative educational initiatives and forging ahead with translational research. Please explore our clinical delivery system for healthy and medically complex children, our educational team based training philosophy, and our research accomplishments in the last several years.

Hopefully this brief introduction has captivated your interest and you will seek further information into the many exciting activities at VCU Pediatric Dentistry. Please visit our Web site sections listed in the margin and see why we are proud of our department faculty, residents, students and staff.