ABOUT USWe are a group of dentists who work in and around the Copper Canyon. Our sponsoring group is Liga International of Southern California. Liga is made up of a group of medical professionals who have been going to Mexico since 1934. Liga has one paid administrator and all other positions are volunteer. Dues in Liga are fifty dollars per year and you must belong to Liga to go on our missions.
Our goal is to make a long term difference in the oral health of the people who live in and around the Copper Canyon. To do this we are limiting our work area to about a dozen small villages around the towns of Urique and Cerocahui. We go to the schools, many of which are boarding schools for Tarahumara children, and do exams, OHI, sealants, fillings and also extractions if necessary. We do extractions for any adult who is in pain or has infection.
We usually travel to and from our work place and sleeping facility but on occasion we will sleep overnight at a school or rural clinic. Work days can be long, as many as ten hours or more or there have been times when we have worked six or fewer hours in a day.
We believe in the adage "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach him how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime". To this end we encourage the local Tarahumara students to consider a career in dentistry and in the fall of 2006 one of the local girls was accepted into the University of Chihuahua Dental School. Unfortunately, although she did well enough academically, she failed to thrive socially and withdrew from school. Right now there are at least two other Tarahumara students in the health department at the U of Chihuahua, one in nursing and one in medical school and just recently we became aware that there are now two indian dental students enrolled at the university.
We have stored, in the Copper Canyon, three portable chairs and units, three air compressors, one gas generator, one dry heat sterilizer, one chemclave sterilizer, instruments and supplies for operative dentistry and sealants, gloves, masks and sundry other supplies. We ask that you bring any favorite instruments you feel you may need. Please mark your instruments with colored tape. We use red tape. Last season, from October to June, 2009 we had four missions to the Copper Canyon in which we treated around 800 patients and one to Poptun, Guatemala where we treated over 200 patients.
The cost of a mission trip to the copper Canyon varies depending on where you originate your trip. Many of our people come from Minnesota and for them the cost is in the neighbor hood of $1,400 per person for the 12 day mission. We will help with reservations for hotels in Mexico and we will organize the trip but everyone is responsible for paying their own bills. We do not handle money for participants but because you are working under the auspices of Liga International the mission is tax deductible if you save receipts.
The mission in January to Guatemala is about $1,600 per person.
For more information on the trips you mail email us at kalinoff@comcast.net or call Dr. Fred Kalinoff at 651-428-7906.
| 