Kanagawa Dental University was originally founded in 1910 as the Tokyo Women’s Dentistry Training School. Since 1963, it has been located in the historic naval base of Yokosuka in the Kanagawa Prefecture, which was the home of the US Navy 7th Fleet and has also been the base for significant Nissan operations.
Co-education coincided with the achievement of university status in 1964. The Graduate School was founded in 1975. The current name dates to the incorporation of the Junior College in 2003.
Its founding spirit emphasises "the practice of the 'spirit of love' that values the heart of compassion for all things and life, that is reverence for life". All classes except those of other languages are taught in Japanese and there is a three-month introductory course in Japanese for overseas students.
In 2018, there were 450 men and 254 women on the six-year dental degree course, but the gender gap has reduced every year since 2012. The university will celebrate its 7,000th graduate in 2019.
In 1950, when it was called the Japan Women’s Dental Welfare School, the institution pioneered higher education for dental hygienists in Japan. The dental hygiene course continues to be a popular course at the institution and is now delivered via the Junior College.
As well as the on-campus dental hospital, the university maintains a clinic in Yokohama. The 2014 accreditation review by the Association of Japanese Universities found "remarkable achievements" in social cooperation such as disaster emergency research, relief work at the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and the creation of the centre for legal medicine, developing skills and knowledge in dental forensics.
