Dental Clinics
Global Dental Relief volunteers provide critical dental care to children — often the first care of their young lives.
Care is delivered in field clinics set up in local schools or municipal buildings. Volunteers form effective, hard-working teams treating and educating local school children over the course of 5 to 6 clinic days.
Patients are brought to clinics class by class from local schools. During their visit, each child receives a dental exam, a cleaning when possible, and all needed restorations and extractions to ensure they are restored to full dental health. If needed, children are called back for multiple visits during the week to complete the full treatment plan. See our dental protocol more information.
Children also receive a new toothbrush, toothbrushing instruction, oral health education and a fluoride treatment. Once dental health is restored, children return to the clinic every two years to ensure a childhood of healthy smiles.
Clinics host up to five dentists and two hygienists. Ten additional general volunteers provide clinic support, working as chairside assistants, sterilizing instruments, applying fluoride, keeping records or educating children.
Why Dental Care for Kids?
For many children, Global Dental Relief volunteers provide the first dental care and oral health education of their young lives. During a clinic visit, each child receives:- A comprehensive exam
- All needed dental care
- A fluoride treatment
- A new toothbrush
- 3 oral hygiene lessons
- All necessary restorations and extractions
- Cleanings and sealants when possible
This infection and chronic pain affect a child’s ability to sleep at night, eat properly, or stay awake in class. Over time, they lose their smiles, self-esteem and ability to thrive.
For many children, Global Dental Relief volunteers provide the first dental care and oral health education of their young lives. During a clinic visit, each child receives a comprehensive exam, all needed dental care, a fluoride treatment and a new toothbrush and oral health instruction.
GDR's mission is to restore children to bright smiles. Most importantly, GDR volunteers return to treat these same children every two years.
Oral Health Program
Global Dental Relief’s Oral Health Program augments the oral health education each child receives during their visit to GDR dental clinics. Under this program, our in-country partners visit each school to ensure children receive:
- an oral health lesson in a classroom setting,
- a new toothbrush,
- and a fluoride treatment.
Each year, GDR dental clinics provide children with oral health instruction during a clinic visit. Since local school children attend GDR clinics every other year, the Oral Health Program reaches children on a more consistent basis, to continue to reinforce oral health awareness and prevention.
Currently the Oral health Program is underway in Nepal, Cambodia and Guatemala, reaching 25,000 children with classroom education and care.
Our hope is that through the steady application of this work, we can instill oral health habits in children, their families, and by extension, the community at large.
Food Scarcity & School Lunch Programs
June 2020 — January 2025 placed on hold
The Food Scarcity Program began in 2020, when Global Dental Relief saw children we had served with dental care for almost 20 years going hungry due to the COVID-19 pandemic. These are children GDR knew, cared about, and was committed to serving.
In both Guatemala and Nepal, food was distributed in packages providing a family of five with food for a week. Each family received an allotment of rice, lentils, flour, oil, a vegetable and salt in Nepal; and rice, beans, a protein powder and a vegetable in Guatemala. Meals were designed to fend off the dire effects of malnutrition and bolster a child and family’s overall health and ability to thrive.
GDR’s Food Scarcity Program ended in Guatemala and transitioned to a School Lunch program in Nepal in 2022 as local populations went back to work, tourist dollars returned and local economic conditions improved. GDR’s School Lunch Program continued for an additional three years until January 2025 to bridge the nutrition gap for children from remote areas in Kathmandu, Nepal.
The Program reached 1090 children at five locations and focused on children living in hostels or boarding schools in Nepal while receiving an education. At many schools, children were fed a sparse diet of rice and lentils, with occasional vegetables. Weekly, these children received two eggs and three pieces of fruit as part of their school-provided daily lunches.
We are grateful to the program’s many donors and sponsors — together we stand ready to respond if future conditions in any of our country locations require basic nutrition for the populations we serve.
