Kevin Lewis FCGDent has been awarded the College Medal, the College’s most prestigious honour.
Reserved for no more than one recipient per year, the College Medal is awarded for exceptional service to the dental profession and its patients in a manner aligned with the values and mission of the College. Dr Lewis has received the award in recognition of his consistent championing of general dental practice during a career spanning more than half a century, and for his contributions to the establishment and development of the College of General Dentistry from its formative stages.
After qualifying from The London Hospital in 1971, he worked full-time as a general dental practitioner for 20 years, then part-time for another ten years while he developed his interests in the dento-legal field. In 1989 he began a 27 year career at Dental Protection, initially as a member of the Board of Directors, then as a dento-legal adviser, and as Dental Director between 1998 and 2016, serving on the Council and Executive of the Medical Protection Society.
In 2017 he was a founder member of the Transition Board, which was tasked with creating what became the College of General Dentistry following the decision of the national board of the former Faculty of General Dental Practice UK (FGDP) to build an independent college for general dental practitioners and the whole dental team. He subsequently served as a Trustee of the College until 2022, and thereafter as a College Ambassador. He is a Founder and Donor of the College, has written for the Primary Dental Journal and has presented College webinars and lectures on Duty of candour: the legal and regulatory risk, Professionalism in dentistry and Preventing wrong tooth extraction.
A long-serving Associate Editor of Dental Practice, and Consultant Editor of Dentistry since 2006, he has provided the profession with contemporary, insightful political commentaries and editorials for over forty years and writes extensively on dento-legal topics. He has also lectured all over the world, provides consultancy and advisory services to a variety of organisations in dentistry and wider healthcare, and is a Special Consultant to BDA Indemnity and a Trustee of the Oral & Dental Research Trust.
He is a Fellow of both the College of General Dentistry and the Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, achieved the Diploma of Fellowship of the former FGDP, and has been awarded Honorary Membership of the British, Irish and New Zealand Dental Associations and of the British Society for Restorative Dentistry.
The College will soon cast its medals following the recent receipt of a Grant of Arms by Letters Patent, and Dr Lewis will be presented with his College Medal in due course. Previous winners (including of the preceding Faculty Medal) were Shelagh Farrell, Mike Mulcahy, Nikolaus Palmer, Professor Ken Eaton, Ian Mills, Andrew Hadden and Ario Santini.