CE Showcase ASM2017: Volunteerism: An Opportunity to Give Back
It’s always a pleasure to speak with Drs. Jack Cottrell and Donna Brode, speakers at the upcoming ASM 2017 in Toronto in May. They kindly accepted to be interviewed about their session: Volunteerism: An Opportunity to Give Back.
Chiraz Guessaier, CDA Oasis Manager
Highlights
Dentists are highly trained professionals possessing very unique and coveted health-care skills. As leaders of the oral health-care teams in our communities we understand the huge health burden of untreated oral disease in populations unable to access care. Our dilemma comes from knowing we have a moral and professional duty to assist the less fortunate; however, with busy lives some find it difficult to manage, and others express reluctance to help out due to fears of placing themselves, their families or their teams in a situation that is not within their comfort zone. In this presentation, we will address the explosive growth of volunteer outreach programs worldwide, and demystify the selection process to allow individuals to critically assess and choose opportunities that best suit their needs. We will discuss what individuals can do to properly prepare for missions and discuss outcomes they may expect to achieve.
Learning Objectives
- Learn the life-changing benefits of volunteerism
- Develop a knowledge base of the types of outreach programs available and how to critically assess each
- Develop a checklist and learn how to prepare for your first outreach experience
Drs. Cottrell’s and Brode’s session runs on May 5th at 9:30 am – 12:00 pm Repeated 2:00 – 4:30 pm
Jack Cottrell, DDS
Dr. Jack Cottrell obtained his DDS from the University of Toronto in 1975. Since 2006, Dr. Cottrell has worked with the charitable organizations Feed the Children, Speroway and Mission of Hope to organize and lead many large volunteer dental missions to impoverished countries such as Nicaragua, Guatemala, El Salvador and Haiti. The focus of these missions is to deliver much-needed comprehensive medical and dental care to disadvantaged populations while providing a mentoring and teaching platform for local health-care professionals.
Donna Brode, DDS
Dr. Donna Brode obtained her DDS from the University of Toronto in 1975. Dr. Brode is past president of the Canadian section of the International College of Dentists (ICD). The ICD is a philanthropic organization which encourages and provides funding and support to dentists to provide humanitarian oral health care worldwide. ICD also provides a detailed register of many of the programs and opportunities that are available for volunteer dentists.
I am so glad that the speakers will be repeating their presentation because I will not be able to attend the morning session since I will be teaching dental students then; and when I do, I’ll be taking notes and then sharing their suggestions with the graduating fourth years, some of whom, I learned recently, weren’t able to take part in the outreach/externship programs offered by one of the schools of dentistry where I teach because they were a little behind and needed the time to complete clinical requirements to graduate, and regretted the missed opportunity. So I told them about the remote areas program run by the ODA here, and have tried to connect them with people who’ve been involved in the delivery of care in the Canadian North in other provinces/territories.
What a great topic for a talk at the ASM, and what a wonderful way these video interviews are to generate interest and share information on clinical and other practice-related topics with dentists across the country. It occurred to me again when I got notice of this video post that it’s so important for us as a profession to work together to ensure access to dental care – whether within or outside our borders.