Tiring but Good :-)

Today I had the opportunity to help my community.  I live in a city just north of

Chattanooga, Cleveland, TN.  While I'm not originally from the area I have lived here for nearly 17 years.  As you can tell from my previous posts, I am in the business of dental hygiene.  Well, the Remote Area Medical came to our area today to do dental, medical and vision care for those in need and some of us from my office volunteered to help.  What an experience this was for me.  I've done other volunteer work though my office (I'll tell you about that later) but this was really cool just to see how the pull this off in the cafeteria of a high school.  They have rows of mobile dental units lined up, I think there were about 40+ chairs. I was at chair 34.  They do free cleanings, filling, & extractions.  They use a mobile x-ray unit called Nomad to take x-rays on the go.  Everything is sterilized just like in an dental office by autoclave.  They have rows and rows of dental instruments and equipment.  It's like a well oiled machine.  I was honored to get to help out.  The downside is you have to stand up to do your treatment which is hard on these 50+ year old legs and back but it was worth it to see the smiles on the faces of those I got to give care too. I had one 12 year old girl who just kept laughing at my crazy jokes and she looks up and "says you are just too funny".  Made me feel great that she was at ease with me.  Then I had the shall we call him the "character" what a hoot he was to treat.  Well, I suppose it takes all kinds.  

All in all it was an awesome Sunday morning.  If your interesting in volunteering for RAM check out their website at www.ramusa.org  to see if they are coming to your area or if you want to travel that's cool too.  We had volunteers from many states at our clinic. I met one male RDH from FL and another volunteer who was a nursing student from CO.  So you don't have to stay close to home if you don't want. Make it a vacation with a purpose!