This award is named for Linda DeVore, RDH, MA and recognizes a dental hygiene graduate of the University of Maryland School of Dentistry (UMSOD) who represents the integrity, intellectual curiosity, community-mindedness, and leadership epitomized by DeVore. The 2020 award honors Jane L. Phillips, RDH, BS ’83, MS ’12, who has dedicated her career to improving oral health as a dental hygienist, instructor, researcher, and community liaison who excels at forming bridges between researchers and patients.

The author of articles published in the Journal of Pain and Frontiers in Psychiatry, Phillips earned her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in dental hygiene from UMSOD and for more than three decades has been a private-practice dental hygienist.

As a UMSOD faculty research assistant, she coordinates clinical research and interprofessional projects within the school as well as with institutions such as the University of Maryland School of Nursing and the Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center. Her ongoing projects include collaborations with the Veterans Affairs Maryland Health Care System (exploring links between periodontitis treatment and dementia) and with UMSOD’s Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery (comparing the efficacy of opioid and non-opioid medications using a third molar extraction model).

Phillips also is the temporomandibular disorder (TMD) diagnostic examiner at the Brotman Facial Pain Clinic in UMSOD’s Department of Neural and Pain Sciences, where she has provided TMD screenings in multiple pain studies. Additionally, she organizes partnerships between researchers and community oral health professionals through the Maryland Practice-based Research Network in Dentistry, which is housed in UMSOD’s Department of Advanced Oral Sciences and Therapeutics.

Phillips is deeply committed to community service and outreach, most notably the Mission of Mercy project, through which oral health professionals offer care to the uninsured or underinsured during free, annual clinics. Additionally, she worked from 2006-13 as a clinical instructor and student coordinator for UMSOD’s satellite Eastern Shore dental hygiene pilot program, which enabled students to complete clinical requirements at local federally qualified health centers while earning their degrees online.

President of the Maryland Dental Hygienists’ Association from 1988-90, Phillips is a current member of the American Dental Education Association and the American Dental Hygienists’ Association. Earlier this year, she was appointed by Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan to serve a four-year term as a dental hygiene member of the Maryland State Board of Dental Examiners.