Tuesday June 15 Clinic Day 2 Update

Yesterday the morning began with presenting Dr. Patterson and Dr. Patel with white coats to thank them for donating their time and efforts to the mission. Don´t they look great in them?

We knew the day was going to be busy because we already had over 50 patients scheduled and four of us were leaving for half of the day. Matt, Brittany, Golnaz and I went to a small village clinic about 30 minutes away from Guaimaca to teach oral health instruction, apply fluoride and do preliminary screenings for patients in September.

While we were there, we screened and treated over 100 patients with the help of three people from Saint Rosa de Lima (The Mission in Guaimaca). The extent of caries and infection in these people´s mouths was unbelievable. I believe out of the 100 patients only 2 had minor issues or incipent caries. It was so sad to see the 5 and 6 year olds with completely bombed out teeth that all needed extractions, completely edentulous special needs children, and parents in so much pain themselves, they could barely eat solid foods.

We did our best to refer the patients with emergencies to our clinic, but we are already so booked for the rest of the week, that we are unsure if we will be able to help them. Luckily, Dr. Robatialle from MA will be here in 2 weeks with a hygenist and the September group will be here in a couple of months.

Back at the clinic, everybody else was working hard to get through the scheduled patients and screenings. As usual, Dr. Patel was amazing and must have extracted 30 teeth from children. During the last procedure of the day, Dr. Patel was doing a routine extraction when the root tip broke off. She had to perform some minor Oral Surgery in order to remove the root tip. The socket had to be closed with sutures. But down here, it´s all in a day´s work!

Dr. Patterson continued to keep all of our equipment fully functional and once the new compressor arrived, set it up to get the last two chairs up and running. Silpa and Hetal were able to perform a root canal on an anterior tooth of a young girl and the rest of us got lots of experience doing various restorations, easy extractions, prophies, and oral health instruction. The older students and dentists are so patient with all of us younger students and we feel like we are learning so much by being here in addition to the amazing feeling that we all have by helping so many people in need. We are very excited for the rest of the week!