Posted on Apr 20, 2020
Our 10 year celebratory Sundowner for all KDT volunteers and supporters held at the Royal Perth Yacht Club on Friday 18th October 6-8pm was very well attended and an excellent evening of fun and reminiscing.
At this stage due to the threat of the effects of Covid-19 to the health of our remote communities and the travel bans in place we have cancelled the May trip. We have left the August trip open ‘just in case’ however concede that it is unlikely to proceed.
 
Our Kimberley program for 2020 was set to start in a few weeks with many preparations well underway to ensure everything runs smoothly. As usual our KDT HQ in Broome was to be the start and end point for most of the Kimberley trips, with some teams flying in and out of Kununurra while we were to be in the East Kimberley.   
 
As with the past two years two trips were scheduled this year to provide five clinical weeks. The three weeks in May were to centre around Halls Creek and include visits to Ringer Soak, Yiyili, Billiluna, Balgo, Mulan, Warmun and Frog Hollow. We plan to spend another few days in Halls Creek at the beginning of our July/August trip and then move to the Fitzroy Valley where we will visit the Fitzroy Valley District High School and the communities of Bayulu, Muludja, Mowanjum and Pandanus Park. Approximately 40 volunteers were to be involved in our 2020 teams including John and Jan who were scheduled every week. It is our hope that these teams will be able to carry over into the 2021 roster, which will be similar. This will allow our team to use the flight credits accrued cancelling the May flights.
 
We are both very disappointed that our 5 final year students and final year paediatric Registrar, will miss out on their KDT experience, not working with the best Teams in the profession and meeting so many if our great aboriginal patients and community friends. 
 
KDT Southern continues to provide a dental service to UnitingCare homeless shelter, Tuart Place - the Forgotten Australians, Foyer Oxford Youth Services and the mental health hostel Devenish House. In addition we continue to provide oral health packs on request to homeless shelters, health centres, playgroups and schools across the state.    
 
To date this year we have visited UnitingCare West for a Friday morning clinic on the 28th February. A further 5 sessions are scheduled for the rest of the year. The continuation of planned KDT Southern sessions will depend on the Covid-19 situation.
 
KDT continues to work in partnership with the Office of the Chief Dental Officer, Dental health Services and the WA Country Health Service through the Kimberley Population Health Unit. Trish Pepper, KDT’s Broome representative works on the Strong Teeth for Kimberley Kids toothbrushing program and provides thousands of toothbrushes to Kimberley school children each year. Thanks to Rotaract for their regular commitment to forming a team to happily repack thousands of toothbrushes into classroom ready packs which are very well received in schools and clinics. Many thanks also to Colgate for their very generous contribution of small toothbrushes and paste as well as My First Brushes and paste for a 0-3 program to be implemented by Trish.
 
We continue to have had very generous support from the Australasian section of the International College of Dentists, the Academy of Dentistry International, the Rotary Clubs of Perth and Heirrison and the Commonwealth Bank Employees Fund for our ongoing three year youth program.
 
A big thank you:  As always we thank our great and passionate volunteers, our past and current dental students and our corporate sponsors and generous private supporters including, Denticare, CBA and SDI without whom KDT could not continue providing this service to people in need in our community.
   
Jan and John Owen
Kimberley Dental Team
www.kimberleydentalteam.com