Where is Time Going?

Another outreach has come to a sad end. This was a one of a kind outreach, we pioneered new places in the Central province. All three stops we made have never had service from the medical ship so it was a great time for us to build relationships, and provide many, much needed services. I was apart of another amazing dental team. The only people who had dental knowledge was the Doctor and myself so it was fun training everyone for their different roles: registration, post-opp instruction, oral health/hygiene education, dental assisting and sterilizing. Picture of our dental team:

After a lovely sail (not, I get horribly sick every time), we arrived in Fife Bay. Oh before I forget, so many of these places that we have visited are literally paradise. They have white sand beaches with crystal clear water, gorgeous scenery. Well, when we arrived we received a very nice welcome on shore which consists of songs and key leader. The dental team headed back to the ship and we prepared for the day.

On this day we had 7 children come with their parents. The Dentist, Rory, was excellent with children and I had the privilege of treating many of their parents. One lady was named Rosalie, and she came on the ship with her daughter, Olive. I saw Rosalie and it was very obvious that she chews betel nut, and she also admitted to it. I went over the effect that betel nut has and how it can even lead to death, due to cancer. She was very aware and told me that it was something she wanted to stop. It is hard because betel nut is a huge cultural custom. So I told her that I would love to clean her teeth and help her with this new start. I cleaned her teeth and got to know some more about her. Afterwards, I gave her a mirror and she seemed shocked. She was very quiet and kind of looked away from the mirror in confusion. I kept showing her the before and after photos and you could see this glow inside of her!! I even showed her daughter and she was so happy for her Mommy. Here is lovely Rosalie and my awesome assistant, Erin:

A funny story… this week I was able to use this amazing instrument called a sandblaster. What does it do exactly? It literally blasts sand onto the patients teeth. It was donated by a Dentist who did an outreach in PNG and realized the need for something more powerful to get the betel nut staining off the teeth. Well I had a patient in the chair and told my assistant, Abby, that we were going to try it out on this case! I look into the mouth with my loupes on (glasses with magnifying lenses), and I can only see the tooth itself because of the magnification. I begin to use the sandblaster and I was absolutely blown away. It immediately took the stain off and I was so excited, it usually is a very long process to get stain off. So, I continue in so much excitement! Then I realize, maybe I should look up and see if the sand situation is okay. Well, to my absolute surprise, the patient’s ENTIRE face was covered with sand (thankfully they were glasses to protect their eyes), Abby’s lap was covered in sand, and so was I. I freak out and tell the patient how sorry I was. I started laughing hysterically because it was such an insane amount of sand everywhere. The patient and Abby start laughing as well. Thankfully he was a good sport about it! I love being able to laugh with patients, especially when it is such an awkward situation. So all was okay and we learned ways to minimize the sand. Here is a pretty cool picture of me JUST using the sand blaster:

All in all it was a great outreach!! In 5 days we saw 58 patients, did 174 procedures, extracted 77 teeth, did 64 restorations, 30 teeth cleanings, gave out 308 toothbrushes, and 184 tubes of toothpaste.  We now head into our very last outreach in the Milne Bay province. We will be headed to an island called Woodlark that has never had services from the medical ship before. I will even be headed to land a few days which I am very excited for!! Please keep us in your prayers as we will be sailing in open ocean water (usually we have been along the coast so it is “smoother” sailing), which means that it could be a very crazy sail as in, I have a high chance of being best friends with the toilet. We will stay in Woodlark for a little over a week then head back to Alotau which we are ported at today. In less than 3 weeks, I will be back in Australia which is crazy to think. Time is flying by!! Thank you again for the support. Here are some pictures taken by our awesome media team: