Dr. Michael Colvard of University of IL at Chicago College of Dentistry Earns Unique PhD

CHICAGO - Feb. 24, 2015 - PRLog -- Dr. Michael D. Colvard, Professor, Oral Medicine and Diagnostic Sciences and Director, Dental Medicine Responder and Technology (DMRT) Office, University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, recently earned a unique PhD.

         Dr. Colvard earned his PhD in Theology and Medical Anthropology through the Graduate Theological Foundation and its parent, Oxford Foundation House, Oxford, UK.

         “My PhD focused on the plants used by the Knights Hospitaliers during the Middle Ages,” Dr. Colvard said, suggesting that “Clergy, monks, and knights attempted to treat dental and oral pain and provide analgesia during traumas and epidemics of the Middle Ages.

         “For example, clergy and knights they used sugar to sweeten the plant mixtures used for pain and periodontal diseases, wine as a topical antibiotic and for pain and sleep, henbane, marijuana, and poppy for dental pain and trauma,” he added.

         Dr. Colvard has been offered a post-PhD Oxford Foundation Fellowship at Oxford University to continue spectrographic research at the UIC College of Dentistry studying the artifacts, specimens, and plants used for ancient dental disease, and how these religious and clinical traditions will impact modern dental care.

         Dr. Colvard previously earned his DDS and Certificate in Periodontics from the Loyola University School of Dentistry, an MTS in Theology and Medical Anthrophony from Seabury-Western Theological Seminary, and an MS in Oral Sciences from UIC.