Did you know that in Sierra Leone tooth ache can be a life-threatening disease?
No? Nor did we. But it’s the reality in the communities that Lion Heart Medical Centre serves.
Complications due to poor dental hygiene are very common in Sierra Leone. Basic dental hygiene (toothbrushing, toothpicking) are not routine in many settings due to lack of knowledge and lack of money to finance. People with tooth ache often don’t visit health facilities when the pain starts. They only come when complications occur.
In our hospital we see patients suffering from complications of poor dental hygiene several times per month. These patients are often younger than 30 and present with life-threathening infections of the face and neck, that can lead to obstructed airway and that sometimes spread into the chest. Often these patients present so late that even correct management with antibiotics and repeated can not save them anymore.
Prevention is therefore better than the cure. With this project proposal we want to start a project in the Lion Heart Medical Centre and its communities to improve dental hygiene from the start, rather than treat complications of poor hygiene at the end. We need €8000 to get this project off the ground and want to raise this before 31 December 2020.
Can you help us? Each euro donated will bring us closer to our goal.