The introduction of implant dentistry in the South Pacific Islands of Fiji.

Fiji is a Micronesian island group in the South Pacific Ocean, approximately 2000km from Auckland and about one-third of the way from New Zealand to Hawaii. It has a population of 945,000. It is considered by the World Bank to be a developing country. Only limited specific information is available about the quality of dental health care in the South Pacific Islands. Overall, though, there is a lack of dentists in the region, as demonstrated by the low dentist-to-population ratio1. There are currently approximately over 100 dentists and over 60 therapists in Fiji2. The Commonwealth Dental Association assesses the dentist–topopulation ratio as approximately 1:9,000 in Fiji, which is far fewer than in Australia or New Zealand3. The Fiji National Oral Health Survey showed that 55-64-year-olds had an average of 14 missing teeth, but few wore removable partial dentures, and only 2.6% of the population wore complete dentures4. As in other developing countries, oral health care provision for Fijians operates at both extremes, ranging from a high Western standard of oral health care for a rather small portion of the population in the private sector, to the majority being offered primarily exodontia without restoration in the government service. There are notable inequalities in oral health and inequities in service provision by financial status. The Fiji School of Medicine (FSM) is the primary provider of formal oral health education in the South Pacific Islands. The School’s programmes have been supported by grants from AusAid and other international development agencies, while the quality of education has been monitored by the University of the South Pacific (USP) with the assistance of external examiners from New Zealand and Australia5,6. In 2010, the FSM amalgamated with five other tertiary institutions in Fiji to form the Fiji National University; this will be the conferring body for all bachelors and higher degrees undertaken in the FSM7.