Walking away with a smile

It was a busy but successful weekend in Reidsville as hundreds of dentists, dental hygienists, nurses and community volunteers rallied together to provide free dental care to hundreds of adults Friday and Saturday.

People started waiting in line for the event at Reidsville Christian Church on South Park Drive around 5:30 p.m. Thursday, according to volunteer coordinator Janet Rakestraw. She said turnout for the clinic far exceeded what she expected.

“We’ve had people from Virginia, Sparta and all over, so it’s not just people from Rockingham County who are being helped today,” she said.

Adult patients received a variety of services including dental cleanings, fillings, extractions and limited partial and dental repairs. The doors opened at 6 a.m. Friday and Saturday with no appointments. Volunteers were needed to set up equipment, greet and direct patients, and even translate for non-English speaking patients.

Upon entering the clinic, patients had to register and visit the medical triage, where they were checked for blood pressure and other preliminary health factors to make sure they were healthy enough to receive care. From there, they visited a bus donated by Blue Cross Blue Shield where X-rays were administered. They were then shuttled to the dental triage, where they received free dental care.

Reidsville resident Angela Scales saw an advertisement for the dental clinic in her hairdresser’s window and brought her mom, who has no dental insurance.

“She probably needs extractions, and we have to come here because she has no coverage,” she said. “Everyone here has been wonderful so far, and there is a nice flow to the clinic. It’s definitely been in order.”

Many patients may have been surprised to find this clinic offered repair for partials and dentures, which isn’t found at many other events.

Mary Ann Grady, a Missions of Mercy volunteer with the North Carolina Dental Laboratory Association, worked to provide at least 10 percent of the total number of patients with services during the two-day clinic.

“We take impressions, make repairs, repair dentures, repair partials and make partials because we hope to send people home with a smile and just make them feel better,” she said. “We’ve been working with Missions of Mercy for the past two and a half years, and we plan to do eight clinics this year.”

Arey Grady is also a volunteer and a committee chairman of the North Carolina Dental Laboratory Association. He said they helped 47 people in Sparta two weeks ago who didn’t have teeth and hoped to help the same number of people in Rockingham County.

Dr. Bill Blaylock, currently serving as director of Missions of Mercy, said he’s been with the program for almost four years and the group has put on 12 free dental clinics around the state each year. He said in 2010, Missions of Mercy saw more than 6,700 people and donated $3.1 million worth of free dental services.

“We try to see as many people as we can in line, and that’s our goal during every clinic,” he said. “We want to get people out of pain, because there are a lot of people standing in line that are in pain. The next thing we want to do is try and fix teeth that might be getting them in pain over the short term, and lastly, we will do some fillings, some cleanings and make some new partials.”

He said the clinic is able to offer a wide range of services because of the volunteers.

“We have such wonderful volunteers; all of our professional volunteers and our community volunteers just allow us to do some wonderful things for these people that have nowhere else to turn,” he said. “We’ve got the N.C. Dental Laboratory Association partnering with us to make partials, we have oral surgeons here taking out teeth, we’ve got hygienists here cleaning teeth and we have general dentists doing fillings and also extractions. It really takes a whole community effort to put this on.”

Pastor Bill Duke of First Baptist Church in Reidsville was a spearhead in making sure the dental clinic came to Rockingham County. He said the community has an enormous amount of need for dental care because many people in the area are underinsured or uninsured.

 “We know even by doing this that we’re just merely scratching the surface,” he said. “In talking with Dr. Vines and some of the others who do dentistry in our county, they said even if we did this thing twice a year, it still wouldn’t meet all the needs. As a pastor, I do what I do in the name of Jesus, but you’ve got a ton of volunteers here who are just glad to help out in the community.”

Duke made initial contact to get the ball rolling with Missions of Mercy. He helped to raise $25,000 to cover costs of the clinic, and he also found Reidsville dentist Dr. Scott Vines to organize dental volunteers, Congregational Nurse Patricia Settle, and many other key players to bring in different areas of help. He said it’s been a tremendous event.

“I just wish more people could’ve been helped, but it’s truly amazing to see what we can do with help from the community,” he said.

Stokes Ann Hunt, director of community outreach for Annie Penn Hospital, organized volunteer nurses to run the medical triage. She said it’s important to have screenings in the beginning to avoid any medical emergencies during treatment.

“A lot of these patients coming in have not had their medications because they’ve gotten up early in the morning, or they spent the night here and didn’t take their medications accurately,” she said. “It’s important to receive a health assessment before they enter the dental triage.”

Hunt said this is her first time being a part of the Missions of Mercy dental clinic. She said she’s been organizing the nurses since February and was able to reach volunteers from across southern Virginia, Greensboro, Pleasant Garden and Rockingham County.

“I think it was important to get involved and get these other people involved, because I sit on the board and volunteer for the Free Clinic of Rockingham County,” she said. “Our waiting list is very long for dental care, so I know how desperate the need really is. I’m so proud of our community for being able to do this.”

Vines said he thought there was great community support with local churches, various community organizations and restaurants that helped out.

“We’ve had over 250 local volunteers help out and we’ve had over 20 dentists each day come and volunteer, so it’s been very successful,” he said. “This program is geared toward the underserved population of North Carolina, and currently over one million people don’t have any type of dental insurance. Some people arrived around 5:30 yesterday evening – 12 hours before we opened, and we had half a parking lot full of people by 10 p.m. Thursday night. There is a great need in this area for dental services so this was just one component to try and help those people out.”

To check out upcoming dental clinics around the state, visit www.ncdental.org/ncds/NCMOM.asp.