WE ARE NOT DENTISTS! I realize I am stating the obvious here but just to put all of our perceptions in their proper place I want to affirm the obvious. This is not formal dental school. This is a quick training for simple cavities with simple hand tools and drills that do not need electricity. This is training to help our village in a very practical way. But not merely for doing physical good. We want to build relationships to share the most important gift anyone can give, the Gospel of Jesus Christ!
I (Brita) have been excited about the opportunity to receive dental training and participate in a clinic for more than a year. The opportunity to show love by serving them in a tangible way that then may lead to opportunities to share the gospel was something that I wanted to participate in. As the time drew nearer, however, I began to have second thoughts. How could I drill a cavity and fill it with so little training?? And with no electricity! Would I loose all courage the first time I saw a mouth full of cavities? I was starting to get a bit skeptical about the whole thing but I was still excited to try.
My Dad arrived to take care of our kids (Thank You Dad!!) and on Monday morning I headed off to class with Josh. Our instructor put us in teams of two so that we could have an operator and an assistant working together. We learned how do an exam to assess if the patient needs treatment, how to drill cavities, scoop out decay and how to fill cavities- on model teeth. On the last day of training in the class room we did exams on partners. My partner, Josh, had no cavities :)
The hand tools we used.
Josh filling a cavity on a model.
Me working on a "cavity".
On Wednesday morning we loaded up two suburbans and headed south.
Our accommodations in village M.
The blue building is the clinic.
When we arrived several hours later we split up into two groups to hand out invitations to the dental clinic. It was exciting for me to see the village and meet some of the people. Josh has told me so much about the village, but to see it for myself was invaluable. I have not been out of the US since the summer of 2009 and it was once again eye opening to see people living in poverty.
The next day was Thursday and we waited for patients to arrive. I was chosen to do the first exam for our team. I think Josh said something like "It's okay, you can go first." Gulp! After we identified what we thought were cavities, (they were really hard to miss!) Dr. Gerry came, did a quick exam and gave us instructions. Our first patient had eight cavities in his four upper front teeth, two in his lower molars and needed two or three extractions. We worked for a while and called the doctor over to check our work often. Hand tools are much slower than the equipment a normal dentist uses. The really cool part is that because of the slow process with no vibrating a cavity can be drilled, cleaned out, and filled with no pain. Quite a few people came to the clinic because they wanted Dr. Gerry to extract one or more teeth (One 32 year old woman needed eight extracted!). He did use anesthetic for the extractions. There is just no way to make that painless. Both of us were able to watch an extraction which was very educational!
Josh doing an exam.
Me checking the progress I was making on a cavity.
One patient brought her pet pig along for her visit. She was reaching down and petting the pig for most of the time she was on the table. The pig didn't like any of it and was loud the whole time.
We were able to see about 35 people over the three day clinic. On the last day of our clinic while one of our teammates was waiting for a patient he was able to share the gospel with several of the villagers.
While the dental work that was done to relieve pain and prevent future problems was wonderful, there were even better things that went on during our time in the village. Relationships were built between our team and the people from village M. The gospel was shared and we are praying that the clinic will lead to more opportunities to share the truth with those who need to hear it.
We also had some wonderful times with the family of believers. Even with the language barrier there is a bond between brothers and sisters in Christ. It was encouraging to them and to us to study God's word together.
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| R and A never smile in pictures :) |
Thank you so much for praying for us while we were in Mexico! We are so thankful that we have such wonderful partners!
