Dental Program
DENTAL PROGRAM
Our onsite local dentist, Dr. Karen Chan, and team provide high-quality preventative and restorative dental care to the Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos (NPH) children and local communities year-round in One World Surgery’s Honduras dental clinic.
Our dental clinic includes 4 procedure chairs and our local team performs procedures Monday through Friday.
Annually, we perform about 2,250 dental consults and 4,000 minor dental procedures with our local team and volunteer dentists and hygienists who all provide the highest level of care for our patients.
Common dentistry procedures offered include:
- Cleanings
- Floride
- Fillings
- Extractions
- Roots canals (front teeth including premolars)
- Minor surgeries
- Pediatric crowns
- Resolution of infectious processes
History of Program
Dr. Bill and Mary Beth Fessler met while on a medical dentistry mission in the Dominican Republic and since then, their philanthropic ways have connected them with One World Surgery and allowed them to successfully establish a world-class dental clinic at One World Surgery’s Holy Family Surgery Center (HFSC) in Honduras in 2012.
On their first medical mission to the Holy Family Surgery Center, they quickly realized that the over 400 children at Nuestros Pequeños Hermanos (NPH), a home for orphaned or abandoned children that shares the grounds with HSFC, needed further access to basic dental care. It was on this mission to Honduras that the Fesslers became aware of the great need for access dental care and where their project began.
The project would become a world-class dental clinic that would serve NPH children, as well as the surrounding community, keeping with the One World Surgery philosophy. Moreover, the clinic has become a rotation or those completing dental school in Honduras and allowed students to serve the community and the children’s home.
“It is a tremendous asset to the community,” says Dr. Fessler.
The Fessler’s have created a working relationship with the Honduran community which allows professionals and patients access to the latest technology in the dentistry field. Additionally, the unified mission and partnership with One World Surgery has brought greater exposure and access to many like-minded professionals in the dental field.
Many of these patients have either lacked consistent access to care or have never previously seen a dentist. Now, because of this program, they are able to find relief from chronic pain and prevent debilitating conditions that impede their daily lives.
“How you present yourself, how you smile, how you feel about yourself matter. [Dental hygiene allows] you to feel comfortable about presenting yourself.”
Through the Fesslers and their community of support, access to world-class dental care is no longer a dream, but a reality. With the expansion of the dental program, an additional Honduran dentist, Dr. Karen Chan, was hired in early 2019 to ensure both NPH children and community members can receive services year-round from this continued partnership between NPH and One World Surgery.
