GPC dental hygiene students, from left, Tori Sutton, Nastaran Vakili and Nazanin Gerami (aka the Tooth Fairy) participate in Seal Georgia Day. (Photo by Leita Cowart)

by Kysa Anderson Daniels

Dental hygiene students at Georgia Perimeter College continued a longstanding annual tradition of providing free dental services to area children during November.

Each year, students from the Dental Hygiene program participate in Seal Georgia Day, an initiative that enables them to gain practical training while offering free sealants to low-income children.

Georgia Perimeter faculty supervised and evaluated 46 first- and second-year dental hygiene students as they placed sealants on the teeth of nearly 30 third-graders attending Doraville’s Oakcliff Elementary in DeKalb County.

“Both classes provided patient education and demonstrated proper oral health instruction to the children,” says Raquel Chang, dental hygiene clinic manager. “They had games that taught the children about healthy oral habits and explained the differences and effects of foods that are good for their teeth and foods that are bad.”

GPC has collaborated with local health departments for more than a dozen years to seal teeth for hundreds of children not receiving regular dental care.

A dental sealant is a plastic material that flows into the pits and fissures of teeth and seals them from decay. According to a report on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website, “poor oral health can have a detrimental effect on children’s quality of life, their performance at school and their success later in life.”

This, Chang believes, underscores the importance of what GPC does each year during the annual event.

At Seal Georgia Day, GPC’s dental hygiene students not only seal the teeth of elementary school children, but help to educate them and provide home care aids and instruction.

In return, GPC students gain experience and demonstrate their competence and skill.

As Chang notes, it’s a win-win.