Local donation supports dental students on overseas mission
A Shropshire dental implant supplier has generously played its part in putting the smile back on the face of patients in South America.
Shrewsbury-based Implantium donated a number of surgical instruments to the Mission Ecuador project, a week-long expedition organised by the Dental Community Fellowship based in South Carolina, which was assisted by Dr Nigel Mallon, owner of Taptonville House Dental Practice in Sheffield, in collaboration with the Sheffield School of Clinical Dentistry.
The mission saw a 69-strong team of dentists and undergraduate students from the UK and United States offer dental treatment, surgery and advice to thousands of local patients. The group set up a temporary clinic at a church in Quito, Ecuador’s capital city, and provided oral surgery, pain relief, and other dental treatments to more than 3,000 patients with ages ranging from three to 101. As part of the project, they also visited 10 local schools to teach 4,000 children basic oral hygiene and how to look after their teeth.
“The work carried out by everyone involved with Mission Ecuador is incredibly inspiring,” Julie Davies, Group Manager for Implantium, explained. “I’m told that some of the patients they treated had been in excruciating pain as a consequence of not having access to regular dental treatment, so I’m just so pleased that our surgical instruments have been able to help relieve such suffering.”
Alexandra Day, Vice President of Sheffield University Dental Students’ Society (SUDSS), revealed: “The muco-periosteal elevators that Implantium so kindly donated were a massive help. Many of the patients in Ecuador had never seen a dentist or had gone without treatment for years, and subsequently many had teeth in a particularly deteriorated state that we had to extract.”
Implantium is a leading UK-based supplier of high-quality, cost-effective dental implants. Run for dentists, by dentists, Implantium is also home to the Implantium Network, a match-making service which helps place patients interested in getting an implant fitted, with skilled dentists in their local area.
For further information about Implantium, please contact 0845 0176 262, email info@implantium.co.uk, or visit www.implantium.co.uk.
