Editor’s Note: Whenever Dr. Michael Seitz helps patients in another country or another community he describes the experience for us.
He and Young Kim recently returned from a mission to Lick Creek, Ky., organized by Remote Area Medical (RAM) of Knoxville, Tenn.
RAM holds close to 100 missions a year, mostly in Appalachia, providing free dental care and eyeglasses and medical screening. Dr. Seitz did root canal work and fillings with Kim assisting.
Dr. Seitz writes: This was our 10th RAM mission: three in Virginia, three in Tennessee, two in Florida, and one in Haiti. I call it “no stress dentistry”: no money, no employees, no insurance, no time pressure. You ask your patient what they want and, if it makes sense, you do it. What they want doesn’t always make sense, so you have to educate them.
I had a patient in Smithville, TN, a tall, strong young man who wanted all his teeth out because, “they’re breaking.” “Where?” I asked. He pointed to his lower front teeth where chunks of tartar were flaking off. He thought his teeth were breaking. “I’m going to fix a few teeth,” I told him, “and then this young lady will clean your teeth and you will keep them your whole life.” He raised his head and said, “Thank you, Lord.”
Sadly, there is a big call for extractions. A combination of bad diets, bad home care, and dental ignorance results in a lot of decayed and painful teeth. People get tired of suffering, can’t afford restorative work, and opt for extraction.
Lick Creek is in Pike County, on the Virginia border, down the road from Marrowbone, Wolfpit, and Greasy Creek. Pikeville, where we stayed, is a prosperous little city with a medical school and a 100-yard drag strip downtown where souped-up 60’s Chevy Novas and Pontiac TransAms smoke their tires. The Hatfields and McCoys killed each other here, partly over the disputed ownership of a hog.
There is not a lot of flat in eastern Kentucky. Civilization is shoehorned between steep, green mountains and, where necessary, the mountains are cut back like giant wedding cakes. If you own a home, it’s likely your back yard is mountain.
Emalene Lee, a spry 86-year-old, is treasurer of the Elkhorn City Area Heritage Council and the reason RAM came to Lick Creek. She was delivered at home by her grandmother. Her younger sister, she said, was three pounds at birth so they heated bricks in the oven and made an incubator.
— Michael Seitz DDS