It’s a rapid-fire dental service this year! A mere 3 weeks after Team 2’s return, Team 3 has now completed a lightning trip to TL, leaving scores of happier people in their wake.
The Australian contingent of the team all hail from Darwin – Team Leader, Dr Ashley Freeman, returnee, Dr Stephanie Shields and newcomers, Dr Jordan Kolsky and Dr Evelyne Cheng (a medical doctor). They were joined by our permanent Timorese team, Ana DJB Tilman, Nico TF Pires and Ana Paula DST Salgado.
The team eagerly arrived with 15 boxes of supplies on the Friday morning, but spent the majority of the day cooling their heels in Dili as they waited for the outgoing TLDP Lions team which was late coming in from the districts. The two arms of the TLDP (Rotary and Lions) share the Troopie between them, but rarely meet. Once the handover was complete, the team hightailed it to Maubara to pack – the team was spending one week in the neighbouring island of Atauro.
It was at this point the team realised that no Silver Fluoride had made it over from Australia! A disaster! This preventive treatment is a key component in our program and it allows us to save many more teeth than we would without it. So – the Silver Fluoride needed to be begged and borrowed from somewhere back in Oz, then sent internationally to TL, then picked up and sent to another island – all within 2 days. Was this team stymied? Not this team. They put their cool, problem-solving heads together, liaised with 3 dental surgeries in Darwin, arranged for a pickup and drop off to the airport, convinced Airnorth to bring the gear over with their crew, organised our Timorese friends to collect the material and drop it off to a boat which would then take it to Atauro; it was in the team’s hands for their first clinic on Monday. A BIG THANK YOU to BUPA Dental in Casuarina, Palmerston Dental and Smith Street Dental; to Dr Johnny Chen in Darwin, Airnorth, Isabel Noronha Pereira de Lima Maia in Dili, and Barry Hinton in Atauro for performing this logistical miracle!
Back to Saturday. The team had to arrive in Dili super-early in order to make sure that the 2 vehicles (and all our stuff) got loaded onto the ferry. A previous team had learned that having a ticket did not guarantee getting on the boat. Getting on and off the ferry is extremely stressful – there are people, livestock and vehicles everywhere and the ramps are steep and unstable. We have almost lost a car to the ocean during one of these manoeuvres previously. Apart from a stressful start, the team had an uneventful journey over to Atauro and were soon ensconced in the laidback simplicity of Barry’s Place – their home for the week – where they were well and truly spoilt by Barry and his team. The remainder of the weekend was spent relaxing, setting up, and organising the week ahead.
Steph and Ana Tilman shared a birthday on Sunday – Happy Birthday to them both!!!! What a special place to have a birthday!
The first three days were spent working in the Vila Maumeta Health Clinic. Atauro has a total population of 11500 people, and approximately 1900 live in the administrative centre of Vila Maumeta. The population is largely Protestant, in contrast to the Catholic-dominated TL mainland.
Atauro has no electrical supply between 2pm and 6pm, so during the bulk of the day, the team ran on a generator – not unusual for our clinics. There are also no petrol stations on Atauro, so thankfully Barry came to the rescue again when they ran out of fuel!
As well as the general community, the team was able to treat some of the local schoolchildren. Steph and Ana Paula screened all of Grades 1-6, but were less successful with Grades 7-9 as there was overlap with the school feeding program. Nevertheless, even with a public holiday to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the independence referendum, the team was extremely busy, with Jordan, Steph, Ash, Nico and Ana Tilman all treating patients, whilst Ana Paula translated, maintained the records, and assisted the clinicians. Evelyne functioned as sole steri-nurse, dental assistant and medical back-up for the team.
Most patients required multiple extractions and fillings. Atauro is an island whose population leads a largely subsistence existence. Many of its communities are remote and there is a high level of disease and few resources. Barry told the team that a number of villagers had died over the preceding year as a result of dental infections. Although the Ministry of Health says that they attend this island regularly; in fact, there has been no dental team here since the TLDP visited 2 years ago.
So when the people of Atauro have an acute dental infection, they have only two choices – to take repeated antibiotics (if they are available) or to travel to Dili where they can make arrangements for extractions. However, many locals are unable to afford even the cost of the ferry to the mainland. It is a sobering thought that this is commonplace across much of TL.
The team spent the last 2 days in the village of Beloi, a rough trip across mountainous terrain. Beloi has the largest population on the island – around 2500 people. Here, many of the locals only speak a local dialect, so it was really lucky that Senhor Lucas, the clinical director in Maumeta stayed to support the team throughout their entire trip. He helped with translating, crowd management, distributing pain killers and fresh coconuts for morning tea. Ana Tilman delivered oral health education to the Beloi kids, in true 21st century style – with a smartphone. Again, the team was busy here and they left after dark on their last day.
After breaking down the clinic in the dark, repacking the cars, catching the ferry back to the mainland, driving back to our Maubara base, then unpacking the cars and repacking the stockroom, then discovering a flat tyre on one car and changing the tyre, I am sure that the team was super-relieved to fall into the welcoming arms of the Sisters at the end of their trip.
All our trips are taxing, but due to the restricted days and remote location, this one was particularly intense. The team in total saw 371 patients. They extracted 657 teeth, placed 294 fillings, and carried out 40 preventive treatments. Good job Team 3!
The only thing that went slightly awry was in Loes when Yvette – driving Sister’s car – temporarily forgot the existence of those rather large drains. Nobody was hurt and there no damage to the car, but Yvette provided a whole bunch of entertainment for the locals at the cost of a slightly bruised street cred.
Many thanks to all our team members, and to their families, who support them, to our lovely Sr Filomena, Sr Joaninha, and to the Maubisse Sisters. Thankyou to Mario and Judite in the Rotary Liaison office in Dili – your help is essential to our work, and thank you to Henry Schein Halas, who continues to support our program. (Pic left: Novagenerian who fought with the Australians in WW2; right: Full of grace, Sr Filomena and everybody’s favorite dish, Brinzela). 
stint in TL late last Friday. They had already lost one dentist, Yvonne, to health issues a month ago, so they were left with a team of 3 – Blanche, Wayne and Eve. The team lugged in 90kg of supplies to TL, including the new Forrest dental cart and the repaired ultrasonic scaler unit, and sailed through customs, thanks to our soon-to-be departing Rotary Liaison Officer, Daryl Mills. The team bought a mobile phone for the use of the teams’ in-country – only USD 10!!! (Pic: Sr Filomena, Bony, Afonso and the big truck)
But soon they were on their way, with Afonso (One of the Sisters’ drivers who has been on many of our trips before) and Bony, in a borrowed yellow tip-truck, carrying all our less-sensitive gear, and Wayne, Eve and Blanche in T2. The trip took 5 hours; the roads were a quagmire due to unseasonal rain. 
since last July. Also heavily involved was Ligia Ximenes, an attaché to the Timorese Consul General, whom Blanche had met at our big fundraiser in 2014, and who generously gave up her time to do the initial translation of the workshop material – thank you Ligia!!!! Bony had been recruited in April and he had spent a lot of time with Tino and Blanche discussing the workshop. The plan was for all three to meet back at Maubara in the afternoon on Friday to go over the presentation and to set up for the next day, which was to start at 8am. The reality was vastly different. The borrowed overhead projector had no cords with it. Tino and Bony stayed in Dili until 8pm at first looking for a replacement, and then waiting for the cords to be delivered to them. They arrived in Maubara at 9pm, and the team stayed up into the wee hours going over the material. 
The next day the projector refused to work for 2 hours, but no one showed up until 10.30, so that was ok! 
The presentation went well – Tino’s delivery was excellent – and all the participants (local doctors, nurses and midwives) found the information enlightening. Success! Tino was especially happy to have been given the opportunity to present the workshop and is keen to do it again. Tino is the TLDP’s longest mentored dental therapist and he has now been given the opportunity to teach students of his own from the University of Timor Leste – he is a measure of our program’s success.
Three very different locations – a small clinic; an open-air pavilion where the team was helped by the local health post director, Mr Paulino, who made all announcements to the patients via loud speaker; and the foyer of Atabae Hospital’s newly built administration building. In all three locations, electricity was sporadic. 
Unfortunately, the dentists discovered that nodding and saying ‘yes’ was not truly indicative of our translator’s understanding. A pact was made with Bony – he would tell them what he thought they were trying to convey (before delivering it to the patient) and they would give him more context. Bony was an excellent member of the team. His light-hearted company and the insight into Timorese culture was priceless. The team, especially Mana Eva, sadly parted from him at his home in Dili, which is almost prophetically close to the Presidential Palace! (Pic: Mana Eva and Bony)
So lucky Team 3 found themselves dossing down in waterfront grass huts at Barry’s Place in Beloi. Quiet, relaxing, super-clean with great food – the team recommend this as a great place to get off the treadmill and de-tech. 
Barry had spent a week fixing a diesel generator for the team (thanks Barry!), but they had to carry water in. Already tired, the team slogged through 3 days of heat, diesel fumes and some of the longest, largest teeth and hardest bone they had come across in TL. Many of the patients had walked for hours, often starting in the dark, to attend the clinic. Due to the patient’s early morning habits, the team ran out of patients by about 3pm each day, and so there was time for a recuperative snorkel and restorative beer. Unfortunately, Barry’s own generator was on the blink and his fridges had to rely on town electricity – available from 6pm to 6am. This equated to warm beer…or warm coke in the case of Mana Eva – yuk. (Pic: One of Lina’s health initiatives for local women – Zumba! They will be entering a Zumba competition in Dili at the end of the month)
Timor-Leste Dental Program 