CU's Global Dental Brigade works alongside the Global Medical Brigade to provide a hollistic model of healthcare reform. In the same temporary medical clinic, dentists provide pro-bono dental procedures and medications to patients. Volunteers shadow local and foreign Dental professionals and assist with teeth cleaning, instrument sterilization and educating community members about proper dental hygiene. Below is an example itinerary for a mock dental brigade and a more in-depth breakdown of the dental clinic.
Anatomy of a Dental Brigade
Patients who enter the medical clinic, if need be, go through three dental stations. The first, cleaning and dental-hygiene education. Here students teach patients how to clean their teeth by physically cleaning them as dentists would do to kids learning how to brush their teeth in America. While cleaning teeth, students communicate in Spanish to patients where to brush, for how long, how to floss and not to swallow the toothpaste! After patients have clean teeth, students bring them to the dentist.
The dentists have lots of patients to see and all for the same reason — extractions. Extractions are the most common procedure performed because almost the entire population neglects to take proper care of their teeth. Many of their teeth rot, fall out and cause other health problems. In order for dentists to extract the teeth in a humane manner, they numb the patients' mouths with a local anesthetic. There is no time to spare for patients to wait for the anesthetic to take effect in the dentist's chair, so we send patients to another room until the anesthetic kicks in. Upon the students' approval that the anesthetic has worked to the extent intended, patients are brought back to the dentist's chair for their extraction.
Unfortunately, students can't remove the teeth themselves, but they take an important role in the extraction procedure. Because the building we work in does not have electricity or any dental equipment, students are responsible to provide light for dentists as well as dental instruments when needed. This station gives students a huge learning opportunity and rare experience because they are immediately over the patient while the extraction is underway.
Even though we are in a developing country, we ensure instruments, protocols and procedures are up to American standards. Each set of instruments must be sterilized after use. Students are fully responsible for this as well as putting together trays of medical instruments for certain dental procedures. This station gives students a different perspective of dental work by enabling them to understand the importance and process of sterilization.