DT News - Canada - Vickie Sugarman, DDS: Doing well by doing good

Robert Selleck, Dental Tribune Canada

Fri. 25 April 2014

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TORONTO, ONTARIO, CANADA: One morning a little more than four years ago, Vickie Sugarman, DDS, woke up thinking she’d like to volunteer for a dental-services-abroad program. Her only real criterion: It had to serve an area that had a truly profound need. Then, unlike many of us, instead of moving on to other thoughts and going about her day, Sugarman sat down at the computer, searched the Internet and found Kindness in Action.

She liked what she read. And she liked that the organization was based in Canada (Edmonton). So Sugarman signed up and later that year found herself in a remote valley of the Andes Mountains in Peru, living and working in what at best would be described as primitive conditions.

And she liked it.

This year she will be participating in her fifth Kindness in Action trip. “It’s a great organization,” Sugarman said. “They are a grass-roots operation. They’re fairly small. But they do a great job searching out areas that have great need for this service. They really know how to identify who has the most need.”

Sugarman, co-owner of a dental practice in Toronto, has made trips to Peru (twice), Guatemala and Ecuador.

The Kindness in Action trips are typically either seven days (with four clinic days) or 14 days (with eight clinic days). The longer trips are needed for the more remote locations. There are typically four our five dentists, and a team of assistants, hygienists and lay support, including a translator. Sugarman’s son, fluent in Spanish, served as translator on one of her trips.

There’s never a guarantee of electrical power being available, even when the team has a generator. The clinics are typically set up outdoors, and whatever chairs and tables are on hand are covered in plastic and used as dental chairs and instrument tables.

From the Kindness in Action website: “The guiding principle for our treatment programs is the relief of pain for the greatest number of people. This is balanced with prevention, dispensing toothbrushes and individual and school hygiene instruction.”

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