Ellen Patterson

Dr. Patterson is the TUSDM Director of Behavioral Science Education, a position she has held since 2019. She joined the faculty in 2013 as the Director of Interprofessional Education (IPE) and has designed and implemented multiple educational programs to promote interprofessional collaboration and to support patient-centered care and communication skills within the dental curriculum. To reinforce TUSDM's commitment to humanistic oral health care, Dr. Patterson is the director of the dental first-year Introduction to the Dental Patient course, which provides a strong foundation for effective communication skills and cultural sensitivity for providing dental care to diverse patient populations. She has also collaborated with multiple faculty colleagues to strengthen the behavioral sciences across the curriculum, including the integration of a novel controlled substances risk mitigation program to promote safer opioid prescribing by oral health providers. She also lectures in behavioral science topics in post-doctoral programs and serves as a mentor to students on educational research projects. Dr. Patterson is the Chair of the TUSDM Committee for T.A.L.E.N.T. (Teaching and Learning in an Environment of New Technologies) which supports faculty development for teaching innovations. She is a past chair of the American Dental Education Association Section on Behavioral Sciences and is a test-question constructor volunteer for the Dental Integrated National Board Examination.

Dr. Patterson is a graduate of Boston University School of Medicine and was board certified in adult psychiatry; she maintained a private practice in consultation psychiatry in Maine from 1992-2000 (not currently in clinical practice.) She completed advance studies in Health Policy and Management at the University of Southern Maine (2009) and holds a master's degree in Health Communication at Emerson College (2011) and a Graduate Certificate in Instructional Design Technology from the University of Massachusetts, Boston (2023).