Dentistry at the Virginia Home

If you know Dr. Terry Dickinson, you won't be surprised to learn of one his latest endeavors to serve our community. 

The Virginia Home is a facility for permanently disabled adults.  This ranges from traumatic brain injuries to cerebral palso to muscular distrophy.   All live their lives in wheelchairs with no hope for improvement.  

These residents require dental treatment just as the rest of the population.  The challenge is finding dental care by dentists that are comfortable in treating this population.   A significant number of the residents don't have the ability to communicate what hurts and what doesn't.

Feeling that they shoud have access to good dental care and knowing that dental students get little to no exposure to this population, Dr. Dickinson decided to start a rotation using 4th year dental students to come to the Home and learn to do the dental treatment on this population.  The students come weekly with an adjunct faculty member to treat the residents.   Exams, restorative treatment, extractions and cleanings are done on the 130 residents.   

The weakness of the program is in the radiographic department since they don't have digital radiography.   The patients would greatly benefit from a portable x-ray and a digital sensor.  The cost of these is prohibitively expensive for the Home to purchase.

Arrangements have been made to purchase a sensor and portable x-ray unit at a significantly reduced cost.  Please consider donating what you can to help Dr. Dickinson provide the best dental care for the residents of the Home.   Please share this link with your friends and family.   No dontation is too small and all of the money will go directly to funding the purchase of the digital radiography equipment.

So much need exists in our own backyard.   I am incredibly grateful for Dr. Dickinson's tireless efforts to take care of others and happy to have the opportunity to support him through this fundraising campaign.

Sincerely,

Karen Kraus



If you would like more information on the Virginia Home, please visit their website at 
www.thevirginiahome.org.