[The organization of Jewish dentists in pre-Israel Palestine].

Abstract

The first modern dental institutes were established in Europe and in the USA during the 1840s. At that period there wasn't a single qualified doctor in Palestine, not to mention a professional dentist. A couple of decades later, as the number of Christian pilgrims grew, some modern hospitals were established and a few non-Jewish dentists opened their clinics in Jerusalem, which was then and in the following decades, the region's largest city. In Europe, dentistry became a popular profession among Jews in general and among Jewish women in particular. The first Jewish dentist settled in Jerusalem in the mid-1880s. Other dentists were slow to arrive and their number began to grow only after the turn of the 20th century. Their professional education varied from those who were trained as apprentices by other dentists to those which studied a couple of years in an academic dental school. The devastation caused by WWI prompted American-Zionist organizations to send a special medical unit to Palestine in 1918. Along medical supplies it also brought a small group of doctors and dentists. The two American dentists that decided to remain in Palestine took upon themselves to spread their medical and scientific knowledge. They also organized the dentists, whose number grew considerably during the 1920s, and called the authorities to regulate the dental profession. In 1926 the British authorities issued a decree regulating all medical professions. It demanded that dental practitioners will be licensed after proving their previous studies and professional knowledge. In 1931, local dentists' organizations decided to establish the Palestine Dental Association. Five years later it was accepted as a member by the International Dental Federation (FDI) and was recognized by the local authorities. Since the 1930s, prominent Jewish dentists from abroad were invited to come to Palestine to lecture, and local dentists participated in international conferences. This prompted the first scientific publications. At the same time dentists published articles in the daily press in which they educated the public on dental hygiene and on modern dental techniques. This momentum was halted in the early 1940s as result of WWII and the Holocaust, but was quick to resume immediately thereafter. 1944 saw the publication of a professional dental Journal, which this issue is a continuation of. By the time the state of Israel was established in 1948, it had more than 900 active dentists, most of them organized in the Israel Dental Association. The only element which was still required to bridge the gap between the dentists in Israel and those in the rest of the modern world was an academic dental school. After more than 20 years in making, the school was opened in 1953 in Jerusalem. From that time on, Israel's dentistry enjoys a worldwide reputation and its dental school graduates teach and lecture in universities and in many dental forums around the globe.