Dr Frank Burke

After qualifying from Trinity College, I spent my formative years as a dentist working in general dental practice. Exposure to the satisfaction, challenges and variety of work in practice has had a significant influence on my subsequent career as a clinician, teacher and researcher in Dublin, London and, since 1998, at the Dental School in University College Cork as Senior Lecturer/Consultant in Restorative Dentistry.

I have considerable experience of how committees work and how to get things done.

My experience includes being Deputy Head for Academic Affairs in the College of Medicine and Health in UCC, President of the British Society of Gerodontology, the British Association of Teachers of Conservative Dentistry and the Irish Division of the International Association for Dental Research. For over a decade I acted as scientific advisor to the Irish Dental Association.

Currently I am chair of the Dental Benevolent Society.

Previously I have served on the Dental Council as a UCC nominee. As a consequence, I know how the Council operates and I have insight into its scope and potential. The remit of the Council is to a large extent limited by the Dentists Act of 1985. The new Council should advocate for the delivery of a new Dentists Act and seek to influence its content.

What came as a surprise to me was the workload associated with being on the Council. It entails a considerable commitment in terms of time preparing for, and attending, multiple meetings of the Council and its sub-committees.

Having recently stepped down from full-time work now it is the right time to put myself forward for election by my peers.

I have the time, the experience and the energy to devote to supporting my dental colleagues for the next five years on the Dental Council.