Feb 24, 2010 4:39:20 AM | Dental Brigades Winter Pilot

Spreading the Word to Stop the Decay!

Kate Leeming, 02/24/2010

This winter, medical brigades got a little more interesting.  With ambitions of moving our health programs in the direction of holistic care, 16 groups worked to bring rural Hondurans quality dental care during the official Dental Brigades pilot.  Not only did our patients receive much needed dental attention and preventative education, 12 new dental brigades have been started.

It all began a couple of months ago. Working with medical brigade after medical brigade, we began to notice the prevalence of tooth decay and the obvious lack of dental care most of our community members were experiencing.  Many would come to the brigades complaining of tooth aches and all we could do was offer ibuprofen.  As an organization, we took a step back and said, “can we do something about this?  Isn’t our focus on alleviation of pain and disease with a focus on prevention?”  Dental Brigades fit this model. The program was established a few years back, but it didn’t have the capacity to meet the massive amount of need in our communities.  And that was when the idea of fusing medical and dental care “brigade-style” came to life.

During this winter season, medical brigaders were given the opportunity to assist in the dental station facilitated by Honduran dentists.  Student tasks included assisting the licensed dentists on extractions or fillings*, performing cleanings and preventative fluoride treatments,  instrument management and cold-sterilization, delivering post-op care instructions, and delivering preventative education “charlas”  or “talks.”

Britany Weissman, a medical brigader from Columbia University commented on her time in the dental station: “A really great experience.  I really learned a lot about dentistry and its importance.  I had a chance to help brush childrens’ teeth and it was heart breaking to see how damaged their teeth were.”

With the help of our amazing Honduran dentists, Dr. Adan Arita, Dr. Fernando Estrada, and Dra. Sonia Nuñez, Dental Chair Charlotte Painter, dental hygiene student Amanda Balcer, and all our student and professional brigaders, we saw a total of 1978 patients, performed 782 extractions, 67 fillings, 227 scalings and 1215 fluoride treatments in January alone.  Great work guys!

If you’re interested in traveling with a dental brigade or would like more information on what we do, check out our website dentalbrigades.org or contact kate@globalbrigades.org.

* University of Washington dentist Dr. Jim Zimmerman graciously donated a unit and compressor to GDB to offer fillings and prophylactic cleanings.  Now we can save teeth that may otherwise need to be extracted. Thanks Dr. Z!

Kate Leeming is the Program Director of Global Dental Brigades.  She started as a medical brigader and fell in love with rural dentistry. She likes long walks on the beach, hugging Honduran children, and papaya licuados.