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Overseas-based Guyanese to spearhead free dental care in Connecticut

Feb 26, 2009 News

An overseas-based Guyanese, Dr. Emmett Wilson, who has been living and practising dentistry in Connecticut, United States of America, for 30 years, has decided to provide free dental care to hundreds in Greater Hartford, Connecticut, next month.
Dr Wilson, along with the 25 other dentists of first Inner City Dental Mission, will provide free dental services — cleaning, extractions, X-rays, fillings and more – to the first 500 who show up on March 21, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., at Community Health Services Incorporated.
The University of Connecticut is sending over some of its top dental students and instructors to participate.
“Everything is falling nicely into place,” Dr Wilson said. “We hope people from the inner city who really need it will make use of it and that people who can afford it won’t abuse it.” He added that he hopes to see many middle class to low-income people, who can’t afford a dentist, come out and take advantage of the free dental services.
The intervention could not come at a better time, with the Connecticut governor, Jodi Rell’s proposed budget set to include the cutting of funding for low-income adults in need of dental care in non-emergency situations.
This is not the first intervention of this kind, which Wilson has been a part of. The 64-year-old dentist travelled to Ghana last year to take part in a similar mission.
After the idea to provide free dental care in Greater Hartford, Connecticut, had been hatched, Dr Wilson went out and began to liaise with local churches and community organizations, such as the West Indian Foundation.
Soon after this, he linked up with Community Health Services, which will cover the instruments and supplies.
“It’s about reaching out, especially in this time when many people have no means of getting health care,” said Leslie Perry, a retired Hartford schoolteacher and a founder of the West Indian Foundation Inc., which, along with Community Health Services, is sponsoring the event.
Dr Wilson said that he has seen patients in their early 20s, with little or no insurance or employment, come in with infected gums and abscesses. He said that many a time, these young adults will miss work because of the pain they are in, and are not confident or comfortable speaking because of the sores, and chronic bad breath.
An infected mouth can also, Dr Wilson said, lead to serious health problems — blockages in the stomach because food is not chewed properly; diabetes and strokes due to gum disease and plaque. (Courant.com)

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