W. Harry Archer was born on March 6, 1905 in Cambridge,
PA. He attended the University of
Pittsburgh where he earned his Bachelor of Science. He remained at the university and received his Doctor
of Dental Surgery degree in 1927. Dr.
Archer immediately joined the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh and began
teaching anesthesia and exodontia. He worked at the University of Pittsburgh his entire career.
During his career, his dental school responsibilities
increased and he ultimately became the head of the department of oral surgery
where he developed new techniques and even new instruments. Dr. Archer strongly felt that that dentistry
needed a more pronounced role in hospital training and that dentistry required
a more standardization and more organization nationally. He believed that the American Dental
Association should more thoroughly regulate the training and practice of
dentistry. He lobbied the ADA to assume
a leading role in the regulation and implementation of hospital dental
department and residency standards.
After addressing the ADA House of Delegates in 1944, Dr. Archer was
appointed Chairperson of the Hospital Dental Service Committee. Dr. Archer organized the committee to
establish basic standards of hospital dental services required of hospitals; to
review applications from hospitals seeking certification for a department of
dentistry; and to maintain records on hospitals with certified dental
departments. His committee also
maintained records of dentists who held hospital staff appointments. Soon after, the ADA set guidelines for dental
services in oral surgery, periodontics, orthodontics, pedodontics, and
restorative dentistry. Dr. Archer and
his committee next began to set requirements for the approval of hospital
dental internships and residencies. This
led to the very first American Dental Association approved oral surgery
residency program being established in 1947 at the Veterans Administration
Hospital in Aspinwall, PA in affiliation with the University of
Pittsburgh.
Dr. Archer worked hard to change the prevailing attitude
that only doctors of medicine should perform oral surgery and face criticism
for admitting patients to hospitals for oral surgery procedures. He was tireless in his efforts resulting in
gradual acceptance among the medical community that hospital dental services
should be respected. He fought hard to
give dentists the right to administer anesthesia and became the first dentist
to be named Chairman of the Executive Committee of the Eastern Society of Anesthetists
- the largest such society in the country at that time with a membership based
comprised 95 percent by physicians. He
went on to leadership positions in other societies and wrote the report "Survey
of Undergraduate Teaching of Oral Surgery in Dental Schools of the United
States and Canada”. This report became
the fundamental direction for predoctoral education in oral surgery.
Dr. Archer was an inexhaustible writer responsible for many
reports and texts that are considered classics.
He was also the recipient of numerous awards and honors and his work was
internationally recognized. He served as
visiting professor in South America, Europe, Australia, and Asia Pacific
nations.
It may easily be stated that Dr. Archer was a dominant
influence that championed the cause of dentistry as a hospital based service;
for setting basic standards for hospital dental departments to follow; for
fighting to allow dentists to administer anesthesia; and for advocating for the
rigorous training of students and defining how oral surgery should not only be
taught, but performed.