Dr. Janet Southerland

Described as a trailblazer, Dr. Southerland recently served as interim dean of the LSU School of Dentistry. Making the most of the role before a permanent dean was named, she worked to expand access to oral health care throughout the state of Louisiana, especially in the more rural areas of the state where there are very few health care providers. Her approach is evidence-based and rooted in interprofessional education, working in collaboration with private dental practitioners, other health professionals, and organizations within the state focused on creating oral health access. With firsthand experience as a longtime educator and practitioner working in hospital-based oral health care, she understands the critical need for collaboration across everyone in the system – including the community.

Currently, Dr. Southerland, the newly named Dean Dr. John Gallo, faculty member Dr. Nicholas Mosca, and several community leaders are working to establish a community advisory board inclusive of payers, providers and community members. Its aim is to develop an access expansion roadmap and create dental education opportunities statewide. Helping to identify funding to expand the school’s Rural Scholars Track Scholarship, which covers tuition for the third and fourth years of dental school in exchange for working after graduation in a federally designated dental health professional shortage area has also been an interest. Dr. Southerland hopes that the experience and opportunity to set roots early in a career will build an emotional connection that helps retain dentists in low access communities long term.

To alleviate access challenges, she has worked to both foster an educational experience that will shape future professionals to help these communities and develop the necessary resources within the community to enable people to receive the help they need. Ultimately, this will help further increase the number of health care professionals that train in underserved areas and stay in Louisiana.