[Construction of distinctive exhibitions and narrative innovation in specialized medical museums: an analysis based on the construction practices of three dental museums].

To explore how specialized medical museums can break through homogenization on exhibition and construct Chinese narratives within the modern medical system, this study takes the International Museum of Stomatology, the West China Museum of Stomatology (formerly the Museum of Chinese Stomatology), and the Museum of the History of Chinese Stomatology as research objects to examine their exhibition construction and narrative practices based on field investigations, interviews, and document analysis. The study finds that, relying on disciplinary traditions and accumulated research resources, the three museums have formed three distinctive development models: internationalized collections focusing on contemporary disciplinary history, generative collections originating from teaching and clinical practices, and interpretive collections driven by interdisciplinary researches. At the narrative level, by embedding Chinese stomatological practice within global disciplinary lineages, national historical processes, and dialogues between ancient and modern medical knowledge, these museums avoid an interpretive framework based on a binary opposition between China and the West, and effectively present the contributions of Chinese stomatology within the global system of modern medicine. The construction of stomatology museums reflects the disciplinary self-awareness of the stomatological community in deeply integrating medical humanities and disciplinary history education into professional training, and has also become an important driving force for the development of related museums and the innovation of their narratives.