President's Letter

At our upcoming meeting in Mashantucket, Connecticut, it will be my distinct honor to assume the responsibilities of the Presidency of the American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry, to serve, and serve with the many friends and colleagues in this organization that I so respect and admire.

As the incoming President, I have three pairs of rather large shoes to fill. Dr. Phil May, the “Jersey trench warrior clinician”, truly a class act, had the wisdom and insight to understand the need for creating a cross-disciplinary organization like ours. Sandy Fenton, like a patient father, had the fortitude to guide us through our organizational adolescence and help us to “grow up” and act like a national organization should act. And, finally, Dr. Rick Rader, a guy Steve Corbin once called, “a rock star” tirelessly promoted this organization around the country and worked with Dr. Keller, Dr. Holder, and others to build our membership in terms of both numbers and quality. If I am to live up to this level of leadership, I truly have my work cut out for me.

As one of the original co-founders of the Academy, I can assure every member that my tenure as President will reflect a commitment to the very same principles that moved us all to form this wonderful group of clinicians and advocates six years ago: a commitment to promoting high quality medical and dental care for patients – especially adult patients – with neurodevelopmental disorders; a commitment to teaching other doctors to provide that same level of care; a commitment to conducting meaningful, patient-focused research that improves the quality of health and life for this unique patient population; and a commitment to continue to advocate, in multiple arenas, on behalf of the patients we serve.

In this spirit, I would put forth this three-point strategy for my tenure as President:

1. In concert with our Executive Director, I intend to work toward establishing a “home base” for our medical CME and dental CEU programs, working with the University of Louisville’s School of Medicine and School of Dentistry in coordinating a cross-disciplinary, continuing education program that reflects the mission and orientation of the Academy. I would ask that all those who have done such stellar work over the years in the continuing education effort work with me to achieve this goal.
2. I feel strongly that, as an academic organization, if we intend to have an impact on quality professional education on a national level in the areas of developmental medicine and developmental dentistry, we need to become the organization that, in some way, certifies the several developmental medicine and dentistry training programs around the country. Two of my predecessors in the Presidency – Drs. May and Fenton – have rich backgrounds in this arena, and I believe we could work together to establish the Academy as the “go to” organization in the area of program accreditation. Dr. John Williams, Dean of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Dentistry, once told me that this organization should be in the business of precisely this kind of accreditation.
3. We have joined with Special Olympics, International in producing a high-quality, DVD-based curriculum - one that provides some valuable, rudimentary instruction for family medicine physicians, psychiatrists, and dentists who are interested in serving this patient population. Now, we begin work on developing a well-thought out strategy for disseminating this product in markets that will get us the most efficient educational “bang” for the organizational “buck.” As we do so, I think we also need to seize a golden opportunity to utilize this curriculum, and this curriculum-marketing strategy to promote a larger national agenda: the promotion of cross-disciplinary, team-oriented, high-quality medical and dental care for our patients.

I believe that by piecing together these three efforts, we can bring the larger educational picture into focus, and further establish the American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry as America’s preeminent professional organization in this emerging and exciting arena.

Dr. Henry Hood is being inducted as the AADMD President in June 2008 at the annual meeting in Foxwoods, CT and will continue to serve in this capacity for his two-year term. Dr. Hood also serves as Director of the Dental Clinic at Hazelwood Center ICF/MR in Louisville, KY.