But I brush my teeth three times a day....

I have conducted over 40 interviews now in Casa de Piedra, Santa Ana and Manchon. These interviews were usually done in a separate classroom where is there was no class held. After discussing with the teacher, we decided that the best way would be to send students one by one to the classroom so I could interview them. While most of the questions were basic, some children had difficulty understanding my accent (this is when working with another organization could have been a tremendous help!). But, most children, more or less understood me and I could get answers from them. After an hour or so though, I would usually get back spasms because I had to use the chair that the children used which was about one foot off the ground.

The road to Cordeza, a community similar to Santa Ana. It´s almost impossible to use any transportation with wheels, especially after rain.

While I still have to analyze the data, I´ve found some interesting responses to my interviews already. My original goal was to identify at least 60 children who brushed their teeth at least twice a day and at least 60 children who didn’t brush their teeth twice a day. I admit that this goal was quite ambitious. The problem I encountered wasn´t the number of interviews, but rather the type of interviews. Right now, almost 90% of the children I have interviewed have said they brushed their teeth at least twice a day though. Actually, most of the children were confused why I asked them if they brush their teeth twice a day, so they responded, ¨No, I brush my teeth three times a day after each meal (Unfortunately, I don´t even do that). I have two plausible hypotheses of what´s happening

1. The kids could be lying because I’m interviewing them, and since they know they need to brush their teeth three times a day, they repeat what have been told repeatedly to please me. If this is right, the good news is that health education has been somewhat effective and at least the children know they need to do it.

2. They really are brushing their teeth three times a day. Then, although I do not have the data for number children that have cavities, why do many children still get cavities? Maybe there’s a reason that I haven’t covered that´s affecting them. Maybe, they’re not brushing properly or for enough duration. Or is there some other reason?

In order to answer some of these questions, I might have to add some questions to my interview and get IRB approval first. Hopefully, focus groups will also help me comprehend the situation better.

Children at the Santa Ana community with brushes donated by Global Grins.

In my free time, I’ve also been helping out a clinic called Hijos de Maiz in San Blas. A dental brigade had come to give free dental checkups, cleanings and extractions in the clinic. They brought all the equipment and efficiently, treated over 40 patients every day. I believe this kind of work is necessary especially because dental checkups are only needed once or twice a year, if they are taking care of their teeth on a regular basis. Two physicians had also accompanied the dentists to help out the clinic. I worked as the translator since the doctors did not speak any Spanish. He would speak to me in English and I would translate it to Spanish to the patients and so forth. In contrast with shadowing or observing, in this kind of work, I was a crucial step and mediator between the patient and the doctor, and I learned a tremendous amount. At times, I did get into trouble because I would not know medical terminology or other crucial vocabulary words. Once, I had to ask a female patient about her menstruation, and without knowledge of the correct word for it, I had to continue to explain the process of menstruation to get the idea across-compound that with the fact that girl was 16 years old and there were 5 other patients and two other doctors in the room. Imagine how uncomfortable that must have been! Either way, it was a good learning experience, and it was interesting to see the myriad of problems that the clinic on an average day.

Dental brigade at the San Blas community.