BY JOSIE HUANG

MaineToday Media, Inc.

The University of New England said Thursday that it is exploring the prospect of starting northern New England's first dental school, which could address the region's shortage of dentists while elevating UNE's prominence in the health sciences.

Officials said the dental school would cost an estimated $17 million to build on UNE's Portland campus - tens of millions less than dental schools proposed in other parts of the country. But the private university still needs investors and foundations to be partners in the plan before it can move forward.

"I think people know that oral health is a huge health care issue in Maine, so we're hoping we find some support for this idea," said UNE President Danielle Ripich.

In Maine, there was one dentist for every 2,165 patients in 2002, compared with the national average of one dentist for every 1,656 patients.

Many patients in the state's poorer and rural communities are on long waiting lists for dental appointments, and some travel more than an hour to see a dentist who will accept the state Medicaid program.

Most of Maine's dentists are either turning away Medicaid patients or refusing to take new ones because the state reimburses dentists for less than half of what they charge.

Ripich said UNE's dental school could turn out as many as 50 dentists a year, some of whom could work in underserved areas.

Some dentists are skeptical that graduates would venture far from coastal and southern Maine, where most of the state's 590 dentists are now concentrated. Ripich said the plan is to expose dental students to other parts of the state by assigning them to clinical sites through partnerships with hospitals or dental practices across Maine.

"As they work in more rural parts, they will hopefully stay there," Ripich said.

Dr. Mark Zajkowski, an oral surgeon in South Portland and president of the Maine Dental Association, said he welcomes UNE's interest in starting a dental school but questions whether there is a need for another one.

He said there are four strong dental schools in New England - at Harvard University, Tufts University and Boston University in Massachusetts, and the University of Connecticut - and a dental program at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Dalhousie sets aside as many as six slots for Maine students, which Zajkowski said are not always filled.

Zajkowski said a new school may also face a challenge in finding teachers - the pay is much higher in private practice - and the millions of dollars it takes to buy and operate equipment.

And he questioned whether graduates would want to practice in rural locations if the Medicaid reimbursement rate stayed the same. "Until the state put its money where its mouth is, you can put a dental school in northern Maine tomorrow and you're going to have the same problems when the students graduate."

The consideration of a dental school comes at a time of rapid expansion for UNE.

Last month, it broke ground on a $6 million laboratory building as part of its plan to become a biomedical research center. And the first class of its pharmacy school will arrive in 2009.

The university now has Maine's only medical school and the only programs for dental hygienists, nurse anesthetists and physician assistants.

Ripich said UNE decided that this is the time to talk about opening a dental school because the university is enjoying record enrollment and retention rates, and the best financial health it has ever had.

"It's almost a responsibility to look at it at this point," Ripich said.

Nationwide, applications to dental schools are up and there is renewed interest in building facilities. A $50 million school is planned in Arizona and an $87 million school is going up in North Carolina.

Ripich said that UNE's dental school would not cost as much to operate because a strong science curriculum is already in place for its other programs. The dental school would save even more time and money by maximizing the use of technology, she said.

For example, high-tech dummies could simulate patients so there would be no need to wait for patients to come in with certain problems.

"Our plan is to work with simulated patients that cry, and say 'ouch!' and gag and do all the same things that the normal dental patient would do," Ripich said.

The university has studied the idea of a dental school for about a year and a half. It recently sent letters of intent to the Maine Department of Education and the Maine Higher Education Council.

Ellen Beaulieu, associate provost for planning, said the university is better positioned to build a dental school than others because it can draw on the expertise of dentists who now teach dental hygienists at UNE and supervise the program's clinic.

"It's really given us a link to the dental community," Beaulieu said.

It is unclear how much tuition would be, but it could be comparable to that of medical students. Annual tuition at the medical school is $38,930 a year.