Dentist lends a helping hand on the high seas
In Nelson, dentist Karen Doouss might extract three teeth a week, but on a recent volunteer trip to Vanuatu, she pulled out hundreds in the same time frame.
Doouss recently spent two weeks as a volunteer on board the ship Pacific Hope with Marine Reach International.
She was part of a 54-strong team that included doctors, nurses, occupational therapists, physiotherapists and optometrists from a number of countries.
She said the trip was ‘‘amazing’’, but along with the other dentist on board, they extracted 319 teeth during eight days, which Doouss described as ‘‘pretty horrendous’’.
‘‘A lot of these people had never seen dentists, never had their teeth cleaned, actually it was like where do we start?’’
In some cases, she would take out 10 teeth at a time.
‘‘There was so much need, we couldn’t sort everyone’s mouth out.’’
The Pacific Hope visited the remote villages Tasiriki and Tasmate on the western coast of Vanuatu’s largest island, Espiritu Santo.
Patients were transferred to the ship on a small tender boat and a translator who spoke Bislama was on hand to help with communication.
The patients were thankful for the chance to have their teeth looked at, although some suffered from seasickness and never made it into the dentist’s chair.
Doouss said it was difficult for locals to access dental services, as they earned a small wage and there was around one dentist between every 35,000 people.
It was the first time she had worked in a floating dental studio and while the motion did not bother her, she said it was difficult to give injections when the sea was rough.
There was also no ability to use x-rays to which proved a challenge.
She said many of the patients also had high blood pressure, which meant there were added complications when extracting teeth.
In New Zealand, Doouss said she would send patients to their GP to get their blood pressure under control first.
‘‘But over there we had no choice, we just had to take them out.’’
With an interest in health and wellness, Doouss also sat down with the translator to talk about nutrition and oral care.
She learnt that people didn’t often brush their teeth and while they could buy lollies in the few shops, not one sold toothbrushes.
It is not the first time she has done voluntary work, having spent a month at a children’s clinic in Jerusalem in the 90s, but she had always wanted to spend more time volunteering.
‘‘I loved that the team were all so unified, it was a really positive experience.’’