Thursday 10 September 2009
Children in Alice Springs town camps are benefiting from a three-week additional dental service outreach by the Central Australia Oral Health Service. They began work on 2 September.
Dental therapist Lynn Cripps and assistant Maree Godleman from Tasmania will provide dental services for children from several town camps around Alice Springs. The mobile dental team are based at the Flynn Drive Dental Clinic and work from Yirara College.
The dental team will be providing treatment and promoting good oral health practices to Indigenous children under 16 years, with children receiving lessons on proper teeth brushing and what foods are good and bad for their teeth. Each child treated will also receive a free toothbrush.
"Overall, we hope to see about 60 children over the next three weeks," said Julie Hornibrook, Manager of Closing the Gap Child Oral Health.
"This work, originally part of Helping Hands project with the NT Emergency Response has been ongoing for the last 18 months. We have successfully recruited more than 200 dental health professionals for short term outreaches and dental service delivery in this time.
"Multiple outreach programs such as these will provide service continuity to the town camps and communities across Central Australia and the Top End," Ms. Hornibrook added.
The outreach teams are coordinated by the Central Australian Oral Health Service Remote Health Services manager, Dr Elise Beachley. This is the first outreach service in CA from the Closing the Gap Funding which will contribute $6.4 million over the next three years to deliver dental health services to indigenous children across the NT.
The Commonwealth funded organisation Remote Area Health Corps (RAHC) recruited the dental team for placement with the CA Oral Health Service. Other 'Closing the Gap' outreach visits will follow in 2009 to the 73 prescribed communities across the NT, complementing the existing service providers.
"We are very excited to be able to deliver such outreach services as part of the 'Closing the Gap' reforms. It is a great example of what Territory and Commonwealth governments can achieve when we put our heads together," added Ms. Hornibrook.
Media contacts: Cameron Jackson 0401 114 113, Anna Campbell 0401 116 144