Category: Blog

In the midst of practicing dentistry in the pre-clinic, studying for my courses, engaging in extracurricular activities, and preparing for the NBDE Part I, I often feel that the tempo of my life is much too fast. Every time I visit home, my parents seem older and my house looks different. Time relentlessly continues to pass. I sometimes forget to pause to think about my life from a greater perspective. Instead of thinking about each task of each day, I want to think about my role in the world and my vision for the future.

Recently, I was nominated by the UW School of Dentistry for the Martin Luther King Jr. Community Service Award, alongside my colleague, Marcus Hwang. Dashing out of our fixed prosthodontics lab course, we arrived at the ceremony perhaps a minute late. The room was full and I immediately realized that the service was much more than an award presentation. A middle school jazz band led performances of the anthem, “Lift Every Voice and Sing” and classics such as “Willow Weep for Me” and “Land of Make Believe”. A local poet offered an interactive spoken word experience and several guest speakers shared heartfelt tributes to the life of Martin Luther King Jr. The ceremony was a community gathering in which we stood in solidarity with one another.

Sitting in the back of the room, I watched as every single member of the audience participated with sincerity and passion. I was reminded of life outside of the university and for a moment, time stood still. The Master of Ceremonies concluded the program with a reading of a quote by Dr. King in which he said, “Make a career of humanity. Commit yourself to the noble struggle for equal rights. You will make a greater person of yourself, a greater nation of your country, and a finer world to live in.”

This statement is a call to action. It offers a perspective to which we can all aspire to. For me personally, it represents my motivations in dentistry and global oral health. Throughout my career, I intend to serve individuals in need, whether locally or abroad. Although the sheer academic rigor and the professional demands of dentistry can become overwhelming, I am fueled by desire to improve the state of the world through my actions. I am thankful to be involved at the DeRouen center because it has given me the opportunity to think and act as a global citizen.

Time slows down when you work with intention and purpose. I hope to continue to learn, to appreciate those around me, and to improve the quality of life for others through my own.

Jessica is the co-founder and Director of Relief Efforts for Husky Health Bridge. She is the President of the UW Periodontics Dental Student Interest Group and actively involved in the AADR National Student Research Group, American Academy of Periodontology, and American Student Dental Association. She is also a member of the Hispanic Student Dental Association and American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry. Besides outreach and research, she enjoys playing both the piano and violin, exploring the outdoors, and entertaining her two cats, Tofu and Dubu (두부).

I am a current 2nd year dental student pursuing a career in oral and maxillofacial surgery. What that means is that after my four years of training in dentistry, an additional 6 years in an oral and maxillofacial surgery program will grant me the skills, privilege, and the medical degree to perform surgeries in the head and neck region (of course, additional fellowships may be necessary) – Whew! But I don’t wish to end my training there.

In the devastating 2010 earthquake in Haiti, 300,000 thousand people lost their lives and much more were injured to the relentless destruction caused by the forces of Nature. Numerous physicians, nurses, and surgeons from around the world swarmed in to aid in this crisis, with oral and maxillofacial surgeons being one of the earliest responders. Since oral and maxillofacial surgeons are specialized to treat diseases, injuries, and congenital defects of hard and soft tissues of the head and neck region, they were essential in treating the bone fractures, facial lacerations, traumatic burns, and reconstructive procedures during the earthquake’s aftermath. It’s been almost a decade since the last major earthquake in Haiti, and not much has changed with Haiti’s dependence on foreign trained surgeons to provide advanced and often complicated surgical procedures—patients are even often flown to the United States for surgeries requiring more complex equipment. Humanitarian relief efforts are still needed in developing countries, but this also reveals the crippling truth that within the borders of many developing countries, lives are lost to preventable and treatable conditions due to the shortage of doctors.

I’ve noticed that this is one of many frustrating challenges in global health: the lack of specialized surgeons and surgical equipment within the developing world. Ever since being introduced to global health by Dr. Stephen Gloyd, I’ve wondered about how I can take my (future) skills in surgery and put it to use in global health. Surgery (Global Health, University of Washington) , being an intense and fine art, requires thousands of hours of clinical experience and coaching to perfect. Global health on the other hand deals with systems-based problems that affects the population as a whole. The traditional method would be to take my specialized skills to treat the patients in need, one-by-one. However, since the UW DeRouen Center for Global Oral Health promotes sustainability, collaboration, innovation, advancement, and compassion, I’ve been encouraged to think more about training local doctors and supplementing existing trauma centers. I want to use my career to develop sustainable options for those in developing countries, and improve the access to healthcare. After all, how else can I answer the question: Why can I be saved in your country but not mine?

It will be an exciting journey, and I am looking forward to learning from the many innovative collaborators I will meet through the DeRouen Center.

You can reach Marcus at: hwajihoo@uw.edu.

About why I chose dentistry

The moment I committed my career path to dentistry occurred while I was teaching English in Taiwan, the country in which my parents grew up. A common practice in Taiwan is to hire a housekeeper, often this means young women move from third world countries to work for affluent families in order to send money. While I was volunteering, I befriended the daughter of a housekeeper and she became attached quickly. When there were group activities she tried to pull me aside so that we wouldn’t play with the other kids. I remember thinking about the factors that played into the situation. Maybe it was her personality, her ethnicity, or her laugh. When she smiled, she had black holes eroding half of her two front permanent teeth, and I couldn’t help but think that it was a contributing factor. A dentist has the capacity to treat the pain from her teeth, but a dentist can also help her feel more confident. I wanted to become a dentist who could help a child make some friends.

Why the DeRouen Center

A large part of why I chose dentistry was to help people. As cliché as the term may sound, the idea of helping people comes in many shapes and sizes. Someone could theoretically develop a pill that solves hunger, others might choose to volunteer at a food kitchen every month. While serving the community on different levels is a good thing, there are also consequences that could arise. For instance, a pill that solves hunger removes the social context of eating and would affect cultural practices.

One practice in global volunteering is “voluntourism,” a combination of volunteering and tourism.  In dentistry, this might look like a privately funded trip with the duration of a week that seldom occurs. I used to believe that dental missions were synonymous to helping people, but after learning more about public health, I began to see how motives don’t necessary align with an improvement of health care. There are a variety of ethical issues that arise with voluntourism, which we can discuss in a later article.

What makes the DeRouen Center different, is that it focuses are sustainability and research-oriented interventions. Historically, dentistry has been focused on restorations, but now we are realizing how paramount prevention is to improving healthcare. Furthermore, we focus on partnering with communities to improve the health of their population. Collaborating not only reveals the needs of the population from the population, but it also gives us an opportunity to learn about culture and values, which is important for us as we practice dentistry locally in America. I believe that the DeRouen Center plays a huge role in the Seattle area because of the diversity we experience here and I’m excited to see how we will impact our communities at home and abroad.

You can reach Belle at belleac@uw.edu.

Who we are

We are students passionate about working with dentistry on a global scale! We join forces with our innovative mentor, Dr. Seminario, in the development of the Timothy A. DeRouen Center for Global Oral Health here at the University of Washington. We have many students and staff who have existing projects and interests abroad, ranging from health system development in Kenya, clinical research training in Thailand, health disparity research in Peru, and access to care for refugees in Seattle. Our roles are not only to participate in these projects as research assistants, but also to get the word out about the importance of global oral health. We believe that it is important to advocate for and learn from communities around the world, and that it strengthens us as future clinicians, researchers, educators, and leaders.

Why we’re blogging

We hope for the DeRouen Center to be a fun and interactive program, and want to keep everyone up to date in an open and honest platform. Here, we will write about our trips, interests, goals, and current events related to global health.

How you can get involved

Feel free to reach out to any of us! We enjoy speaking about our many projects and sharing our enthusiasm for global health with others. We’d love to hear your thoughts, ideas, and aspirations for the future of our center. Also, look forward to our upcoming blog entry series of team member introductions to hear more about our individual interests.