Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Day 3 of Clinic

It is almost lunchtime on the 3rd day of clinic.

In yesterday's afternoon session, we continued to treat a large number of patients.  Many people come here in need of extensive dental work - even when we can't fix all their problems, we make sure to at least take care of their chief complaint in order to relieve pain.  Yesterday we finished a little earlier than on Monday, so we finally had some time to relax in the evening.

Since we arrived in Guimaca, we have seen extensive decay of the maxillary anterior teeth.  Yesterday we learned that it is a local custom to take pieces of unripe green mango, place them between the front teth, and suck on them all day.  The sugar and acid from the mango are probably the cause of the anterior caries.  We have since been instructing patients not to keep fruit or anything else sweet in their mouths for such long periods of time.











This morning, patients lined up early and kept us busy with many procedures: single extractions, wisdom tooth extractions, full mandibular extractions, composite restorations, and amalgam restorations.  And we continue to educate the patients about not keeping mango in their mouths all day.











Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Day 2 of Clinic!!

We are in the middle of Day 2!  
We forgot to mention that on Sunday most of us played soccer with the locals and got our butts kicked.  They even gave us some players from their team, which made it 11 vs. 6, but that didn't even seem to help very much.  
We had such a long day in clinic yesterday and worked from 7:45am until 8:00pm.  Most of the patients that we are seeing have had their appointments for over a year and come from long distances.  Many other people come and sit outside for the entire day to try to be seen.  Although we cannot promise anything, we try our best to fit them in and were able to see everyone yesterday, which meant some of us staying until 8:00pm to finish.  Many of the patients come in having severe decay and pain.  We have been doing a LOT of extractions, some root canals on anterior teeth, and many composite restiorations on anterior teeth where we basically have to rebuild the whole arch because of the severe decay.  We were exhausted last night and went to bed fairly early to prepare for today.
We got another early start at 7:45am and had a very hectic morning!  We saw very similar cases to yesterday, but are getting faster at deciding what the treatment plan should be and restoring what we have time for.  We also saw a mentally ill little girl who had such a severely decayed tooth that only the base of the crown was left.  Although very uncooperative initially, she did so good when Dr. Graves extracted the tooth with assistance from several dental students.  We are also getting used to the very poor or no suction on several chairs, chairs that don't lean back, and minimal light.  
So far, so good!!








Sunday, December 11, 2011

Give Kids a Screening Day

Barely unpacked and with eye boogers still unwiped from the corner of their unrested eyes, the dental crew awoke today at 7 am to prepare the clinic for a busy, busy week of drilling, filling and not billing. The day started with a delicious breakfast cooked by Naman, Barrett and Lindsay. The pancakes were delicious. It's remarkable how certain products, ie Krusteez pancake mix, have penetrated deep into the wildnerness of Guaimaca. I was personally delighted to catch a secret piece of Honduran grown banana stealthfully baked in with love... it made every other piece of banana-barren pancake taste wanting.
... Sorry forgot I wasn't writing for Yelp. Sister Maria had seized the opportunity to test her newly arrived recruits with an impromptu screening of local children. Though cramped for space and unfamiliar with the location of anything in the clinic, we accepted her challenge of screening and scheduling appointments. Of the thirty something kids we screened, there were many with severe, severe decay... we're talking nothing left but a mere shell of tooth or root tips. Fortunately, none of these kids were in pain that merited urgent care. Most kids were then forwarded to Sister Maria for appointments later in the week. We plan to extract severely decayed primary teeth and restore others. We then spent the rest of the day organizing, cleaning and setting up the clinic ready for tomorrow, bright and early. Pictures coming soon.

Day of Travel

After a long 21 hours of travel, we are finally at the Mission in Guimaca.  First we arrived at LAX at around 10pm and barely made it our gate prior to departure.  Then we took a 5 hour flight from LAX to El Salvador, then from El Salvador to Tegucigalpa. Right before our flight out of LAX, we met some USC dental students on our same flight going to Roatan for their own dental mission trip.  Hopefully we will get to hang out with them before they leave.  We also saw some UCLA alumni-students doing a Habitat for Humanity mission in El Salvador.

So Tegucigalpa is a town known for their crazy landing into the airport.  In 1996 they added a few more meters to the landing area because it was so dangerous or a plane fell off a cliff or something (not too sure on the details).  The plane flies so close to the hills, between a narrow valley.  Here is a youtube video that shows it...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_z5HtME9n8

In Tegucigalpa airport, we waited for several hours for Dr. Farhoumond, Dr. Graves, and Father Craig to arrive.  Unfortunately, Dr. Farhoumond lost her luggage.  I guess that was bound to happen to one of us.  But she was so sweet and cool about it.  What a classy lady!!

Afterwards, we left for Valley of Angels where we did some souvenir shopping and had dinner with a view.  It was pretty challenging for our two vegetarians to order food with no raw veggies or veggies not peeled by us.  Father Craig reminded us "Peel it, Cook it, or Forget it."

It got pretty dark after dinner, and it was a bumpy and scary ride to the mission.  Once we got to the mission, we unpacked in our respective rooms, then went to the local ice cream shop.  It was pretty long night so some of us turned in early while the girls watched a movie in bed.

The Sisters and Father Craig were so welcoming and accommodating.  We really appreciate their hospitality. Well stayed tuned, for our adventure will start soon.

Saturday, December 10, 2011

WE MADE IT!!!!

The entire group made it safely to Tegucigalpa, Honduras this morning! We are now heading to the mission. Here are some pictures from LAX and the airport in Honduras!
 










Saturday, December 3, 2011

Packing Day!

Today we had our packing day to get ready for our departure next Saturday, December 10, 2011. Everyone came over to pack up 6 bins full of dental supplies along with a portable unit, suction unit, and Nomad-handheld x-ray system. 

We will be sending 12 dental students, 2 dentists, and 1 pre-dental student to the dental mission in Guaimaca. Everyone is excited for the upcoming trip and the opportunity to provide dental care to the underserved community in Honduras.

Attending Dentists: Dr. Farah Farhoumand and Dr. Stuart Graves

Fourth Year Dental Student: Kelly Hwang

Third Year Dental Students: Sapna Lohiya, Melanie Tongoc

Second Year Dental Students: Naman Desai, Samir Farhoumand, Lindsay Graves, Allison Inouye, Salina Massei, Barrett Nordstrom, Jay Ponto, Sakib Vahora, and Ryann Walker

 Pre-Dental Student: Cloris Castro





Wednesday, November 30, 2011

The History of the Honduras Dental Mission

HISTORY OF THE HONDURAS DENTAL MISSIONS 

The Diocese of Fall River created the Honduran Mission in 2000. The mission is in the town of Guaimaca which is located two hours from Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. Through the health clinic, girls' school programs and other events, the Diocesan Mission aims to help the poorest of the poor in rural Honduras.

The Diocesan Mission has just completed construction on the dental clinic this year yet there is still much to be desired. UCLA ASDA (American Student Dental Association) students are working to raise money and supplies to create a functional dental clinic for the Honduran Mission. We will be providing dental treatment to thousands of patients between the June, September and December trips we have organized for 2011. The treatment will include, oral health instruction, prophylaxis, restorations, extractions and more. Most of the people we will be providing care to have never had any dental treatment and many do not even have the resources for or understanding of the importance of preventative care. Our goal is to provide treatment to as many patients as possible, but even more importantly, to educate them on proper oral health care. This will enable them to bring what they learn back to their families along with the toothbrushes and toothpaste we will be handing out. Our UCLA mission groups are very excited to be able to put our skills to use for such an impoverished community.

Last year we sent two trips of 16 dental students and dentists each to the clinic in Guaimaca. The 2010 trips were the foundation for our current efforts to improve the clinic, the mission trip organization, and our fundraising efforts. This year, we have already raised over $3000 for the mission as well as received lots of donations from various companies such as P&G, Johnson & Johnson, Brassler USA, Medical Protective, Patterson Dental Supply and more! Here is the link to the 2010 Honduras Dental Mission Blog that documents all of our activities between the two trips. Here is the link to the June 2011 Honduras Dental Mission Blog that was an amazing success earlier this summer as well as the September 2011 Honduras Dental Mission Blog.

Stay tuned for updates while we pack the supplies and prepare for the December trip departure on December 9th!!! 

 

If you would like specific information about the mission, how to donate money or supplies to our *NEW* 501c3 non-profit foundation or possibly participate on one of the mission trips, please email Stephanie Cappiello, founder, at HondurasDentalMission@gmail.com.