The School of Dentistry hosted eight dentists from Uganda, Africa. The dentists participated in dental simulation activities, lecture presentations, and learned new dental techniques.
A donation of 30 dentistry chairs from the University of Alberta's School of Dentistry to the Kigali Health Institute (KHI) in Rwanda helped open its doors to a new curriculum in 2013. As a result, the School hosted eight visitors from Rwanda's bordering state Uganda, who participated in dental simulation activities, lecture presentations, learned new dental techniques.
"The facilities here are amazing," says Isaac Okullo, dean of the School of Health Sciences at Makerere University, where dentistry is housed. "Coming here is helping us gain hands-on experience. We hope to take this experience back home and translate it into our community. Hopefully, we can train others who didn't have the opportunity to come."
The exchange is sponsored by a vocational grant by the Rotary Club of Raymond and the Rotary Club of Kamapala North. And the guests were hosted by Steve Patterson, associate chair (academic) from the School of Dentistry, and Drew Cahoon ('76 DDS) alumnus.
Okullo says while they are steps away from achieving the same level of equipment and space as the U of A, the fundamentals of practicing dentistry are the same.
"We're pushing to raise awareness around oral health and oral disease prevention. We have limited resources available to us, so learning and improving our restorative treatment techniques here can encourage others to work differently," says Okullo. "We were doing a lot of extractions before but our training here has focused on amalgam fillings."
Juliet Nabbanja, Chief Dental Surgeon for the Ministry of Health in Uganda, is responsible for supervising all regional hospital dental units in Uganda. Her role includes developing guidelines, policies and strategies for oral disease prevention and health promotion.
Nabbanja says the donation of dental chairs meant she could work with dental units on an implementation strategy.
"It's a good start," says Juliet, adding she will continue working with Cahoon on projects to reduce oral disease in poor and marginalized populations. "But our goal is to make the units as functional as they can and this means more equipment is needed."
Patterson says being socially responsible is something the School instills in students as well.
"Giving back to our communities through shared learnings like this is a perfect example of how we model the behaviour we wish to see," added Patterson.