Nicaragua Mission

I just got back from a dental mission to Nicaragua. Thanks to the generosity of many friends and family I was able to travel to a remote areas of one of the poorest places in the world to provide dental service. Most of these people are so poor it's hard to even imagine. We charged 50 cents a visit, which represented a sacrafice for the people and we would try to do as much work as they could safely tolerate in one appointment.

I extracted more teeth in the first couple of days than I did during a six week rotation in our oral surgery clinic. We also did a lot of restorations. The Nicaraguans are good craftsmen and they make very nice dentures. But, you can't wear a denture with a bunch of broken down teeth in your mouth. More than a few of the patients we treated traveled for an entire day just to be treated.

I can't imagine being in a situation where you come to a building to be treated by dentists who don't speak your language and don't understand you at all. We had an interpreter, but there was still very little dialogue between doctor and patient.
It is really hard to put the exterience into words anyway.