Impact

Community impact

Many of the children served by this program come from low-income, Indigenous and new-immigrant families, often with limited or no access to oral health care due to financial, geographic, language, and other barriers. The program is critical to getting these kids the care they need, and some parents are so grateful that they will choose not to move so their children can remain at a school where they can access this care.

Being in constant pain from dental caries, abscesses or infection can make it hard to focus on learning. It can also prevent a child from socializing if their breath smells bad or they have discoloured teeth. With treatment, teachers are seeing improvements in their students’ learning and play patterns. Removing infection prevents disease and illness, and treating issues before they become emergencies means less families presenting at local hospital emergency rooms.

Student impact

Many students choose to enter pediatric dentistry after their experience in the school visit program. Before the program, there were very few students who did. Students working in the program are taught to recognize the signs of a nervous child and implement behaviour-modification techniques to distract them or make them more comfortable, sometimes using nitrous oxide to help them relax. Amazingly, in a room with 70 young children all there to receive dental treatment, it is very rare to hear any crying.