University News

Dental Van Brings Care to Rural Kids

Michael L. Phillips, DDS '95

Michael L. Phillips, DDS '95, one of four pediatric dentists who staff the mobile dental clinic, treats nine-year-old Kalishia Swager, who had two cavities filled during a recent visit to the clinic. (Photo: Lois Baker)

Nine-year-old Kalishia Swager slides into the dental chair in the 39-foot mobile dental clinic parked outside Ripley Central School in southernmost Chautauqua County, New York. Today, she will have two cavities filled. Without this traveling dental office, no one would care for her dental health.

Kalishia is one of the 7,000 children in Chautauqua County who have logged 20,000 treatment visits in the UB School of Dental Medicine's traveling dental van since it took to the Southern Tier's roads 10 years ago.

The mobile dental van is the brainchild of Louis J. Goldberg, dean of the UB dental school from 1993 to 2000 and now a professor of oral diagnostic sciences; and Paul R. Creighton, clinical associate professor and associate dean in the Department of Community Dentistry. Expanding public service was one of Goldberg's primary goals for the school. Since Chautauqua County has the largest number of medically underserved persons in rural Western New York, it became his focus.

The Gebbie Foundation of Jamestown provided a $160,000 grant in 1995 to purchase the van; clinic dentists treated their first patients in October 1996. Today, the clinic takes up temporary residence at 12 schools throughout the county during the calendar year. “We can deliver care to about 3,000 children a year by virtue of the van's capacity,” says Creighton. “In the future, we hope to replace the current van with a larger one with four dental chairs.”