Isabel Garcia

A. Isabel Garcia is an American dentist and academic administrator serving as dean of the University of Florida College of Dentistry since 2015. She was deputy director of the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research (NIDCR) from 2007 to 2014. Garcia was the acting NIDCR director from 2010 to 2011. She was a Rear Admiral Lower Half in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps.

Education Garcia completed a bachelor's degree in chemistry at the University of Mary Washington in 1976. She earned a doctor of dental science degree from the Medical College of Virginia in 1980. She earned a master's degree in public health from the University of Michigan School of Public Health in 1988.

Publications Garcia has released a variety academic publications, with her most recent being "Use of Cannabis and Odds Ratio for Oropharyngeal and Oral Cancer-A Cohort Study" (2025). Other recent publications include "The use of chlorhexidine mouthwash and diagnosis of primary hypertension in a large hospital cohort" (2024) and "Reduced Odds Ratio for Oropharyngeal Cancer in Patients with a History of Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) Vaccination in a Large Hospital-based Population" (2023).

Garcia was a health scientist administrator at the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality where she managed research on health services and primary care. She was succeeded by Martha Somerman in 2011.

At the University of Michigan School of Dentistry, Garcia took the role of an adjunct assistant professor and lecturer. In 2024, as dean of the University of Florida College of Dentistry, Garcia helped in creating a program for dental student to learn how to use Artificial-Intelligence to help diagnose and treat dental problems.