As some of you know, Mark has been volunteering his skills, by providing essential dental care and training in Tanzania. His most recent visit was in September 2011.
Mark became involved with the charity Bridge2Aid several years ago. He travelled to Tanzania on the Dental Volunteer Program for the first time in 2009 and has been back every year since, this year becoming a clinical team lead.
The aim of the Dental Volunteer Program is to teach emergency dental care to medical officers, who provide most of the basic medical care for the population, since there are so few qualified doctors and dentists. Emergency dental care in this context means mostly the removal of decayed or infected teeth.
While extraction of bad teeth is something that is taken for granted in the UK and, in fact, usually seen as something negative when so many restorative options are available to us, in Tanzania it is a service most of the population don't have access to. While a typical patient in the UK who uses an emergency dental service will report to have been in pain for hours or days, most patients that Mark sees in Tanzania will measure the time they've been in pain in months or years. And the consequences of a persistent dental infection in the absence of antibiotics can be extremely serious, sometimes resulting in death.
The program involves a theory element, which the officers will have carried out before the UK dentists fly out, and then a structured two week program of intensive practical training, followed by an exam to assess their competence. When an officer passes, Bridge2Aid provides them with the equipment they need to carry out their dental duties on top of their day-to-day medical duties.
The program has been in existence for several years now and the next phase, which is being investigated by Bridge2Aid currently, is to move into more regions in Tanzania and into neighbouring countries, and to train the experienced medical officers to become trainers themselves so that they will become less dependent on outside help.
If you would like to know any more about the work Bridge2Aid does, or Mark's involvement with the charity, please email Mark at mark@cgdp.com.
