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By creating spaces where pre-clinical and clinical training are combined, the design makes it possible for new dental students to acquire the necessary technical skills to transition seamlessly from learning by simulation to caring for patients in a clinical setting. The College of Dental Medicine believes that this new clinical environment could have substantial implications for the broader fields of dental education and care, helping to better integrate dental practice with the larger healthcare enterprise

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Center for Precision Dental Medicine, Columbia University

The Columbia University School of Dental Medicine will undergo significant upgrades of its teaching facilities, including a new 15,000 square foot facility for preclinical simulation learning and patient care. The design translates the school’s vision for dentistry into architectural form.

Located adjacent to the school’s existing space for education and patient care, this new operatory environment supports simulation learning and patient care within the same setting, making the preclinical experience as realistic as possible. Through the iterative process of researching, observing, designing and testing, the team has arrived upon a single prototype that effectively simulates the preclinical dentistry experience. S-shaped partitions envelope a dental chair and its surrounding equipment, their arrangement determined by the optimal ergonomic conditions required by dentists. Additional services include the development a master plan for the college through the extensive review of CDM’s current and future needs.

SITE: Vanderbilt Clinic, within the NewYork-Presbyterian / Columbia University Medical Center Complex

COMPONENTS: 16,000 ft2 / 1,500 m2; outpatient clinic and teaching labs

CLIENT: Columbia University College of Dental Medicine, New York; Columbia University Medical Center, New York

PCF&P SERVICES: Master planning, interior design, and industrial design

Status: Built
Location: New York, NY, US
Firm Role: Master planning, interior design, and industrial design
Additional Credits: Architect of Record: Jeffrey Berman | Architect, New York, NY
Mechanical / Electrical / Plumbing: Cosentini Associates, New York
Interiors: Pei Cobb Freed & Partners

The design organizes the two wings of the 5th floor into two practice areas. Each is supported by its own reception area, waiting room and patient affairs office; clinical director’s office; and imaging rooms. The two practices share clean storage, materials, and soiled collection spaces. Each practice is comprised of three neighborhoods of eight dental chairs, individual faculty work stations and digital design and fabrication areas for 3-D printing of dental prostheses. Simulation mannequins for pre-clinical training are available at each dental station.

Columbia University’s College of Dental Medicine (CDM) commissioned the redesign of the 5th floor of its home in the Vanderbilt Clinic of the Columbia University Medical Center as part of a master plan envisaging the restructuring of dental education, research, and patient care. The new project is the prototype for CDM’s collaborative, technology-driven curriculum, and will be a model for subsequent renovation and redesign of other floors of the Vanderbilt Clinic.

The design of The Center for Precision Dental Medicine at the 5th floor of the Vanderbilt Clinic is an inventive reinterpretation of the spaces within the original 1928 building, designed by James Gamble Rogers. An open, loft-like space with plentiful daylight and low translucent partitions provides unobstructed views throughout the clinic and to the outside. Vaulted ceilings and raised floors integrate indirect lighting, air, medical services and data distribution.

The dental operatories allow for a full spectrum of procedures, barrier free access for people with physical disabilities, and ergonomic comfort for both patients and practitioners. Curvilinear partitions with translucent screening provide patient privacy while creating generous aisles for circulation. All details of the operatory design support the seamless integration of the digital technology and manual skill that is essential to contemporary dental practice.