Awards

Neal A. Demby D.M.D., M.P.H.

Myron Allukian Jr. Lifetime Achievement Award for Outstanding Contributions in Community Dental Programs 2017 Recipient

Dr. Demby, who began working in a community health center in 1969, has devoted his career to improving the oral health of vulnerable populations at the local, state, and national levels. Early in his career, he developed an innovative service-learning model of community-based dental residency programs located in community health centers throughout the nation. These programs provided training for dental residents in federally qualified health centers, thereby not only significantly increasing the capacity of community health centers to meet the overwhelming demand for services among individuals with low incomes but also resulting in a high-quality, community-oriented oral health work force.

Dr. Demby went on to create the largest post-graduate dental program in the United States and the world, with about 400 dentists in CODA-approved residencies serving some 400,000 underserved individuals a year in about 300 community health centers. These dentists are trained in advanced education in general dentistry, pediatric dentistry, periodontics, endodontics, orthodontics, and dental anesthesiology. A dental public health residency was initiated in 2014. Residents who do a second year also complete a community, public health, or clinical research project. Beginning with a single general practice resident at the Lutheran Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, in 1974, his program is now a national resource that has created a pipeline of community-oriented dentists. Many program graduates work in community oral health programs after their residencies, providing a badly needed addition to the work force focusing on the underserved.

Dr. Demby has lectured extensively and consulted in the United States and abroad. He has received numerous grants that promote residency training, faculty development, video and distance learning, school health, HIV/AIDS services, quality assurance, and early detection of oral cancer. He has had a lifetime of outstanding contributions to community oral health programs and has volunteered for missions to Belarus, the Dominican Republic, and Honduras.

Dr. Demby earned a B.A. degree in sociology and art history from Rutgers University in 1964, a D.M.D. degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine in 1968, and an M.P.H. degree from Columbia University in 1974 and is a Diplomate of the American Board of Special Care Dentistry. He currently serves as senior vice president, NYU Lutheran Department of Dental Medicine.