The initiative is changing lives, he adds. “At some point the masks come off and you see people’s smiles. There’s a new level of self-awareness and self- respect, more self-confidence when you have teeth that people can see. What better way to market what we do?” “The Foundation funding has made a huge difference, adds Mary Jo Kasenchak, DMD, a staff dentist at Project HOME. “The patients here just cannot afford a root canal most of the time, so it’s really devastating to pull a tooth when it could absolutely have been saved. For some people maybe it’s the last molar they have to chew with. We do anterior teeth now, but [before 2018] we did not do any endo at all. It’s incredible to be able to take that burden of cost off people who already live with that burden every day and make it just about what’s best for their health, instead of what they can afford.” “Something we see quite a bit of here are patients who are trying to get a job and get their lives back together, and they have pain here and pain there, we want to save their teeth, but they can’t interview for a job or stay in a job because they have so much pain,” notes Kasenchak’s colleague Ingrid Carvo, DMD. “Providing that treatment is really important to lift them up out of poverty.” “Our dental services were really impacted as a whole by COVID,” comments dental director Janine Burkhardt, DMD. “We’re really lucky to have our partners at Einstein still willing to come in, and before the grant they were bringing all their own materials and supplies. They take a huge hit in their own productivity to come see our patients. The patients are just so grateful too. It makes them feel human again.”
FOCUS 2022
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