29 March 2007

Retiral of Professor David Stirrups

Photo opportunity - 4.30 pm, Friday 30th March,
Campbell Room, 1st floor,
University of Dundee Dental School.

Professor David Stirrups, co-ordinator of the Dental & Oral Health and Health Psychology Unit at the University of Dundee Dental School, retires from the University on Friday March 30th.

Professor Stirrups has been at the University for fifteen years as Leader of the Dental School’s Orthodontic Section. He became the Dental School’s first Teaching Sub-Dean, dealing, among other things, with the School’s first teaching review for the Scottish Higher Education Funding Council.

He has been the East of Scotland Orthodontic Specialist Training Programme Director since his arrival at Dundee, as well as being heavily involved in supporting Senior House Officer Training.

Professor Stirrups has also served on the General Dental Council and latterly he has served as Coordinator of the Dental and Oral Health and Health Psychology Unit at Dundee.

He considers himself to be an "accidental academic", primarily a numerate clinician with an enquiring mind and a need to find some answers.

His interest in orthodontics stemmed from his own partially failed treatment, which he now freely admits was his fault rather than that of his orthodontist.

This led him to study dentistry at Sheffield (having turned down an offer to study in Dundee), where he carried off the undergraduate prize in Orthodontics. He subsequently had his interest in clinical research awakened when working in Oral Surgery and received the British Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons research prize for his first project.

Difficulties in obtaining statistical advice for further research projects whilst training to be an NHS Orthodontic Consultant in the north of England (he failed in an application to be trained in Dundee) led him to do an Open University degree of entirely mathematical modules and a Master’s degree in applied statistics.

For thirteen years he was an NHS consultant at Glasgow Dental School applying his statistical skills to enable him publish on a diverse range of topics. This led to him being recruited to the Chair of Orthodontics at Dundee.

Clearly honours were even at that stage, and both he and the University have since been content for him to pursue, in his order of priority, clinical patient care, teaching and research. He says he has always enjoyed clinical teaching of both undergraduates and postgraduates.

Away from his work, Professor Stirrups’ outdoor interests are orienteering, and gardening. When the Scottish weather drives him indoors, his obsession is 18th and 19th Century postal history, having edited a book on the Postal History of Dundee.

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University of Dundee
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