News from our recent Evanston clinic event

Volunteer to work our next Clinic | www.dentalaccessdays.org

November 2018

CLINIC #12

Our heartfelt thanks to the terrific bunch of people that volunteered and our supporters that made this 12th clinic possible. It is a genuine honor to work with all of you. It takes the personal time of about 60 individuals to accomplish our 2 day clinics.

We have a core group of dentists now. Some even volunteer to work both days. But we are still struggling to increase our dentist volunteer pool so we can add additional clinics. We also had a lot of providers drop-off of our roster in the last weeks leading up to the clinic. Although we had backups there weren't enough to replace them all and we wound up with one or two empty chairs and a lack of assistants both days. And we had a few that would have been there if they had been contacted prior to the event. All together that reduced our overall performance numbers.

If you are, or know a dentist, please encourage them register with us and volunteer for a day of service .

Our Partners

The Levy Senior Center is part of the Evanston Park District . Our thanks to Karen Hawk and Robert Russo for helping us secure this great facility for the clinic. Others that helped us reach out to patients included : Nicola Whyte and Evonda Thomas at the Evanston Board of Health, A Just Harvest, Sarah's C ircle, Goldie's Place, Trilogy Behavioral Healthcare, and Thresholds.

Special Thanks and Happenings

This was our first clinic that put our two new

Statim 2 000s int o service that were donated by the Chicago Dental Society and the Wrigley Foundation. They worked as planned and helped us keep up with the fas t sterilization tu rnover we need.

Phyllis Lynch, Mike's wife, joined us as a volunteer for the first time this clinic. She helped with sterilizing. Phyllis had prior work experience as a dental assistant and picked everything up really quickly. Thanks Phyllis!

Spencer Bloom DDS reviewed and repaired all of our instruments and sharpened all that needed it.

Kimbra Bloom sterilized all our instruments prior to the clinic and improved their organization and display so everything was safer and more accessible during the clinic.

We tried something new on Saturday. We usually have one of our dentists triage patients so they have been examined, x-rayed, and sometimes numbed, prior to getting into a chair for their work. Since we had an open chair we couldn't fill, we didn't want to tie up a dentist doing diagnostics instead of dental work. So we contacted MidWestern University Dental School. Through their Chapter of the American Student Dental Association we were able to connect to a D4 student very near graduation, Mirette Boushra. With the supervision of our dentists, Mirette did our triage and cued up our patients. Thank you Mirette and ASDA MidWestern !!

Grant Sims DDS worked a full 8hr day with Mike and Bill at Mike's Garage (the best small engine repair shop around). We converted the delivery systems to deliver both high and low pressure and re-hosed each unit with more flexible hoses the new units now come with.

These improvements to our basic platform were funded by a grant from the St Peter Legacy in Mission Fund, an outreach program of Northfield Community Church. NCC also funded this clinic's expenses and members assisted in recruiting our dental providers.

David Yoakim and Midway Dental Supply surprised us by filling our pre-clinic inventory restocking order at no charge.

Aundrea Hoffman from Kulzer Dental Products contributed composite materials for restorations. Aundrea also drove up from South Bend Indiana and helped with Saturday supply distribution, sterilizing, instrument restocking, etc. Aundrea and Kulzer have been helping make Dental Access Days possible for about 8 years.

Evanston Lighthouse Rotary contributed funding and supplied our setup labor. One of the guys is in a picture we have had on our website for years. I took a new shot as he pushed a chair past me and remarked how many times he has helped us out. As he whizzed by he responded "I just turned 96"

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Glenview Community Church also contributed funding and man-power. The guys gave up their Saturday night helping teardown and unload us back in Elk Grove Village.

Dr. Vince Brandys brought a number of eye doctors in training from the Illinois Eye Institute and setup vision screening Friday morning. A patient who regularly attends the clinic when it's at Levy was diagnosed with Glaucoma. Vince set him up with an appointment at the Institute. The malady was in its early silent stage so the patient was unaware of any problem. There is a good chance that with treatment, Vince's early

intervention will save the patient's eyesight.

Luke Stephen DDS and Spencer Bloom DDS did tooth reconstructions that were pretty impressive. Here are the before and after shots.

Silver Diamine Fluoride - UPDATE

This was our 2nd opportunity to offer Silver Diamine Fluoride treatments to arrest tooth decay. We contacted all the patients that received treatments at our April 2018 clinic so they could be examined and treated again if necessary. Three patients came in. All showed very positive results so we intend to continue using it.

15 patients received SDF treatments involving 44 teeth at this clinic. Dr. Peter Neuhaus of Wilmette has taken the lead evaluating the treatment option for us. One of the return patients that received the SDF treatment, as well as a lot of other work, emailed me after this clinic.

Here are her comments :

" I am so extremely grateful for the help I have received from Dental Access Days! I feel like I have a whole new mouth! The work that Dr. Neuhaus has done for me is amazing! I thought for sure I would have to have most of my teeth pulled and I would just be out of teeth until I could get dentures. Dr. Neuhaus saved my teeth!!! If it were not for Dental Access Days I would have been toothless before I hit 40. I am very great-full for everything Dental Access Days and Dr. Neuhaus have done for me. If there is anything I can do to show my gratitude for all the help I have received please let me know! Thank you !! "

Our results

Next Clinic - April 5th & 6th 2019

Willye White Park Center

1610 Howard St

Rogers Park, Chicago

April 5 and 6 , 2019

Quite a few of our core providers have already committed to working it. Please consider volunteering and encourage dental professionals you know to sign up. Here's a link to our website you can send them.

Helping one person may not change the world,

but it may change the world for one person.

Heather and Bill McKinley

Post-Script

Dr David Barack, a Periodontist at Old Orchard medical building recently offered a continuing education seminar. One of the activities at the event was a raffle with the proceeds going to Dental Access Days! His office also made a matching contribution.

Thanks very much David !!!