School children, aged care residents and families in rural and remote communities throughout Tasmania are having their dental needs addressed by the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS) Mobile Dental Program by utilising a very special vehicle supplied by Woolnorth Renewables.
The custom-designed truck is the first of its kind in Tasmania – a $350,000 mobile dental clinic that simply parks and connects to 3-phase power and water to provide an enhanced dental service – effectively managing infection control and patient comfort to provide vital oral health care to those who need it most.
An RFDS dentist or dental therapist with a dental assistant forms the mobile team that assesses and treats patients on site as a free service.
The mobile dental vehicle is able to remain in-situ for weeks on end if necessary – maximising the number of consultations and treatments.
The community-based service, funded by the Commonwealth Government, targets rural and remote areas of Tasmania where people often face barriers in managing their oral health because they can’t afford to travel to city-based services or fund treatment, because many do not have access to transport or are managing family and work commitments.
Woolnorth Renewables has funded the development of the dental truck to allow RFDS to offer its dental outreach program to areas that cannot resource adequate fixed clinic facilities.
In the financial year 2019/20 the RFDS Mobile Dental Team used fixed clinics around the north and north-east of the state to see 1191 patients over 2581 visits to deliver 13,423 dental treatments.
The Woolnorth Renewables dental truck will ensure that even more rural areas can be reached statewide with considerable less lost time on travel, setting up and packing down for the dental teams.
