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JAMAICA'S SUCCESS STORY! A history-making collaboration between International Smile Power Two thousand and six was a record year for the 1,000 Smiles Project with 100 volunteers coming from four countries serving some 9,000 Jamaicans. In just four short years, with the indispensable support of Sandals Resorts International, this remarkable act of collective heroism has become the world’s largest international humanitarian dental project. That’s right, the world’s largest! For the second year in a row, the project spanned seven weeks across two separate parts of Jamaica. In Ocho Rios and Each session had an education team that traveled throughout the The populations we worked with were largely poor rural Jamaicans working in farming or tourism sectors. These communities have one dentist for every 80,000 Jamaicans. Each year we go to Jamaica and pull a lot of teeth. While this is very important work, we felt we were not making enough of a long-term difference in the overall oral health of the communities we were serving. With the guidance and permission of the Jamaican Ministry of Health, we chose two sites (Walkerswood and Cave Valley) to be “Child-Only” clinics. This new program was successful beyond our imagination. We were we able to see almost every child in two communities (500 total) between grades one through seven. In addition, the number of total procedures completed in the Child-Only clinics was significantly higher than the adult clinics. Most kids would first get a cleaning, then move to the next chair for sealants, if needed. They would then move again to get fillings, and finally move again if a tooth required an extraction, if needed. Sometimes, kids had to come back for more than one day. In all, over 2000 teeth were sealed in this new program. This element of our project now completes a four-pronged approach to sustainability: Scott Ellis, a Patterson Dental repair technician, donated three like-new dental chairs with lights. He then came on the project to assemble a three-chair clinic complete with vacuum pump and compressor, just like you would find in your dental office at home. With a little elbow grease and some expert coaching from Scott, we learned how to set up (and break down) a real dental office in a couple hours' time. In general, this stationary equipment performed much better than our portable gear, especially on procedures like sectioning a tooth. What is significant is that we creatively turned donated stationary dental equipment into portable equipment while improving the overall performance for volunteers. The net effect is that we reduced volunteer frustrations and improved their productivity, while saving thousands of dollars. This“experiment went well enough to expand the system to at least one more clinic in 2007. Sandals Resorts International deserves a hero’s applause for believing in and supporting our work. This company truly cares about Jamaica, its people, and especially its staff. Sandals management and staff deserve a tremendous amount of credit for the success of the project as they support the efforts in so many, many ways. Once again key staff from both the St. Ann and Hanover Health Departments not only assisted but joined right in the work. This important partnership means that our work is well-supported by the local experts! Not only is a great deal of information shared between the American and Jamaican professionals, but lasting friendships are forged also. We owe a great deal of thanks to the Jamaican dental nurses, assistants, administrators and others for supporting and caring for us.
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rural parts of the parishes providing education and passing out brushes and paste to over 7,000 children at some 35 schools. The education team is considered critical to the overall efforts of the project. The goal of the education team is to prevent the youngest children from growing up with the widespread and severe tooth decay that is found in so many young and old adults today. 