Neimar Sartori DDS, MS, PhD

Sartori, an assistant professor of clinical dentistry at the Ostrow School of Dentistry, was born in São José do Cedro, a tiny town of 10,000 people in the south of Brazil. Two years later, Sartori’s father took the opportunity to buy affordable farmland and moved the family north to Altamira. Altamira is technically the biggest municipality in the world, covering an area of 62,334 square miles. However, the region was largely untouched when the Brazilian government began encouraging people such as Sartori’s family to relocate and help develop it. We didn’t have electricity or running water. We had to get water from the river, Sartori says of his family’s home in the Amazon. The family spent seven years on their farm, during which Sartori had no access to formal education. At the time, my parents had only an elementary education, he says. They wanted me to study and at least finish high school. At age 9, Sartori and his family moved back to São José do Cedro, where he attended school for the first time, enrolling in second grade. During middle school and high school, the idea to become a dentist began forming in his mind. Coincidentally, he had been honing his hand skills for years by drawing and helping his mother with tailoring work.

He also jokes that having fun while dressed as a dentist for a parade as a child helped a little bit too. His parents encouraged him to apply to dental school, and he attended the Federal University of Santa Catarina School of Dentistry. During the dental program, he discovered his interest in esthetic dentistry.