Dental Point Refugee Project in Greece
Published: 25 August 2017
One of our Dentists, Thomas Slack, has recently volunteered with The Dental Point Project in Greece. This project provides Dental care to adult and child refugees based in the refugee camps in Greece, as well as orphanages and temporary accommodation.
The charity (NGO) is part of the wider NGO Health Point Foundation. This was set up by volunteers to provide much-needed Health care to those currently residing in refugee camps across Europe.
Tom was part of a team based in Thessaloniki, Greece. Working over 4 days, he helped to provide dental care to those in need with the charity, and Clyde Munro provided donations of much needed dental materials and equipment to aid with their continued support to those displaced by conflict in Syria.
Tom spent his first few days as part of a team of UK volunteers including dentists and dental nurses, providing dental emergency care. He faced many challenges with limited equipment, language barriers and makeshift dental chairs! The team aims to see as many people each day either in the camps themselves or in access centres where people have been given temporary accommodation. This included an orphanage where they provided dental care that was much needed for young and adolescent boys, families placed into temporary accommodation and in tents within the camps themselves.
“The shock of seeing some of the conditions and the length of time these people have been displaced is incredible, My friends and I were deeply moved by the respect offered to us and the resilience and strength of those we met.”
“Although the services we offered were limited, the equipment temperamental and the clinics very busy, you could really see how such a service can improve someone’s quality of life. We take for granted that these services are available to us and without this project, the refugees in these camps would have no access to dental care. We were all taken aback by the level of gratitude offered to us that week, and as long as the humanitarian crisis continues in the area, we all agreed that we would not hesitate to help out in the future.”
Clyde Munro is very pleased to support the continued efforts of the project and proud of our staff members for offering their skills, time and knowledge to help those in need throughout the world.
Further details of the project can be found at www.healthpointfoundation.org/projects/dental-point-project/.