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News from Schools

Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard School of Medicine

Piamkamon Vacharotayangul, DDS, PhD
Associate Surgeon, Division of Oral Medicine and Dentistry, Brigham and Women’s Hospital
Director, Oral Medicine Residency Training Program, Harvard School of Dental Medicine
Instructor, Department of Oral Medicine, Infection, and Immunity, Harvard School of Dental Medicine

This October, Dr. Piamkamon (Piam) Vacharotayangul, DDS, PhD has joined the Division of Oral Medicine and Dentistry at Brigham and Women's Hospital and assumed the directorship of the Oral Medicine Advanced Graduate Education Program at Harvard School of Dental Medicine. Before coming to the Brigham, Dr. Vacharotayangul worked as head of the Division of Oral Medicine and instructor at Srinakharinwirot University and a part-time oral medicine specialist at several private hospitals in Thailand. Dr. Vacharotayangul’s clinical and research interests include improving the oral and general health in people living with HIV as well as those with chronic oral lesions and oral morbidities after head and neck cancer treatments.

We welcomed Dr. Brittany Klein, DDS, a dental graduate from University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to our residency program as our PGY1 resident. In July, a trio of residents in the program, Drs. Shaiba Sandhu (Chief Resident), Rossella Intini, and Yuanming Xu co-wrote, directed, filmed, edited and rolled out the new introductory program VDO on YouTube. The VDO shows cases what our program values and highlights its strengths in clinical services, training and research. Drs. Sandhu and Intini are graduating from the program in June 2021.

In response to COVID-19 and ongoing restrictions on 2 year Harvard dental student clinical rotations, the Program will implement the “Virtual” Early Clinical Education rotation in which students are first exposed to and learn about the specialty of Oral Medicine. A third-year resident (Dr. Rossella Intini) and one faculty attending lead interactive sessions that involve a small group of students in order to facilitate their engagement and participation. The aims of these sessions include understanding the scope of practice of the Oral Medicine specialist, learning the importance of safely delivering dental care to medically complex patients, and recognizing how systemic disease can affect the management of oral health care.


University of Washington School of Dentistry 

David Dean, DDS, MSD, DABOM, FDS RCSEd

  • Dr. Mark Drangsholt received UWSOD’s 2019 Distinguished Alumnus Award. Dr. Doris Stiefel, a long-time member of the department, and founder of the DECOD clinic, was also honored with an Honorary Lifetime Member Award. 
  • We welcomed three new graduate students in the oral medicine program, Dr. Neetha Antony, Suhaib Borgeia, and Dr. Ohood Mohammed.
  • Dr. Leah Bowers (a past graduate of the Oral Medicine program at Carolinas Medical Center) joined the Oral and Maxillofacial Radiology residency at UW. 
  • Dr. Jackie Wong was named the director of Teledentistry at UWSOD.  If any AAOM members are interested in potential collaboration regarding telehealth/telehealth-related research, please contact Dr. Wong ([email protected])
  • Dr. David Dean succeeded Dr. Mark Schubert as the director of the OM service at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance after Dr. Schubert’s retirement. Dr. Dean also received individual development grants through the SCCA Medical Leadership Development’s High Potentials Program and the UWSOD Dental Alumni Endowed Faculty Fund.
  • Dr. Bea Gandara (one of our faculty) and Dean Kolbinson (one of our past graduates) were both inducted as fellows in the American College of Dentists yesterday.

School of Dentistry University of California, San Francisco

Dr. Zahra Al-Safwani has been recently named Chief Resident of Oral Medicine at the University of California San Francisco.

Dr. Al-Safwani obtained her dental degree at Jordan University of Science and Technology in Saudi Arabia. After completing a one-year fellowship program in medically compromised patients at the University of Pennsylvania, she received a scholarship from the Saudi Ministry of Health to pursue the Advanced Education Program in Oral Medicine at UCSF. Zahra has distinguished herself as a resident by her excellent clinical skills and her meticulous approach to patient care.  After her Chief Resident year, she plans to return to her home country to expand oral medicine in her region. Dr. Al-Safwani spends her time after clinics with her supportive husband and her two kids.