The orthodontic program in the University of Louisville is basically a 24-month program. It's mainly consisted from didactics, clinic, and research. And all the graduates will receive the certificate and the master's degree.
When we first start here, we have two weeks of boot camp, so pretty much hit the ground running learning orthodontics. And then after that, we're in clinic for the majority of the day. We see adult patients, teenage patients, with a wide variety of different kinds of cases, too. Invisalign, traditional braces. We also do a lot of in-house aligners. And then some other complex cases would be cleft lip and palate, and then surgical cases as well.
It's really important to see a diverse amount of patients. Everything we get to see here and learn how to do here just helps us when we get out into the real world.
We have a very tight interdisciplinary team. We work tightly together with Pros, Perio, Surgeons, and Pedo. And then we refer our patients to each other and we treat all together.
We have specific seminars with the oral surgery residents and with the periodontic residents where we present lectures for each other and have collaborative conversations about our patients.
We already have two types of scanners. We have two types of printers, CBCT, and we even have 3D soft tissue analysis, 3dMD.
We have multiple 3D printers here. We can do things like make our own appliances, make retainers. We do in-house aligners where we set up the teeth, move the teeth how we want them, print the models, and then make the aligners. It's been really great. That's the way ortho is going is digitally. To get the access here has been really wonderful.
Having the opportunity to do research, especially with the faculty that we have here and all the experiences that they have, it makes it very streamlined. It's really helpful because orthodontics is really evidence-based.
We all have our own projects. I'm doing one based on AI and how it can help us determine what stage of growth people are at based on a skeletal X-ray.
The faculty is amazing. We have a wide range of faculty as well, both full-time faculty, part-time, and then faculty that come from private practices. And so getting that full scope of experience from the faculty is really helpful.
It is only a two-year program, which is awesome because they do an excellent job of packing everything into two years. But I think it's even more important in a two-year program to teach your residents how to learn on their own, which I feel they're doing a really great job on.
I feel we have an open-door policy. I sometimes will see the residents after clinic go out and have dinner. Since there's only six per class, there's 12 residents, it's a tight-knit group.
We really just have a great culture and a great family here. We can lean on each other whenever we need to, both in the clinic and outside.
I wanted some place that was going to be like a family to me. I wanted to be supported. I wanted to learn, but I also wanted to meet people who would be in my life forever. It's been hugely important.
Louisville is excellent to live. I've enjoyed every second. I've even considered staying. The food scene is really fun. There's a ton of restaurants and varying cultures and foods. There's a lot of fun sports. The University of Louisville has almost every single sports team there is. Derby week is really fun, and there's like two weeks of fun activities going on around the city.
I think picking here has been the best decision I think I've made. I think we all say here that we think we won the lottery. To be an orthodontist is to win the lottery. But to get to go here and learn how to do it here has been particularly special.
