Four Dentistry Students Provided Dental Care to Residents on the Tapajós and Amazon Rivers
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Four students from the School of Dentistry spent nine days in Brazil this August on a medical boat, providing dental care to more than 250 residents along the Tapajós and Amazon rivers.
Dr. Kamila Kantovitz, clinical assistant professor at the School of Dentistry, led this global learning experience. She ran a similar program while working at a university in Brazil. The experience was a collaborative initiative between UMB, the Federal University of Western Pará, and the private university São Leopoldo Mandic, which provided medical and additional dental care to more than 500 patients.
This innovative initiative addresses healthcare inequities, including critical oral health disparities among riverside, indigenous, and “quilombola” (descendants of enslaved Africans who formed independent communities) populations in the remote regions of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil.
Spanning nine Brazilian states, the Amazon rainforest has a dispersed geography and limited highway system, making healthcare delivery challenging. Because rivers serve as roads, healthcare is delivered by hospital ship. The medical and dental ships deliver care to around 20,000 people each year.
Integrated into the Brazilian Universal Health System, the hospital ship is a fully functional mobile teaching hospital, equipped with a hospital floor with medical suites and dental chairs, a bloodwork laboratory and instrument sterilization facilities to ensure safe, efficient care, as well as a storage area for supplies, medications, and other essential resources to support the healthcare team during expeditions.
“It serves as a connection between academic training and real-world healthcare practice, while giving these communities an opportunity for high-quality dental treatment,” Dr. Kantovitz said.
The UMB students played a crucial role performing dental examinations, cavity treatments, extractions, and preventive services. To ensure effective communication and interaction with local communities, bilingual professionals were present to bridge language barriers and facilitate communication.
The boat and participants visited four riverside communities and one indigenous community. The boat, donated by Netherlands, functions as an externship location that universities can rent.
Dr. Kantovitz partnered with Dr. Eve Desai, senior instructor in the School of Dentistry’s Division of General Practice, and Dr. Carlos Faerron Guzmán, associate professor of Global Health at the School of Graduate Studies, on the experience.
The Center for Global Engagement awarded Dr. Kantovitz a President’s Global Impact Fund grant to help fund this work. Dr. Kantovitz called the grant “a unique opportunity to return to my country and give back to the population that I belong to.”
“Programs like this have the power to transform students and how they see the world. To be a faculty member, you can be anywhere, but to make a difference, that is the point,” Dr. Kantovitz said. “Leaving some seeds here is the most important part.”
You can look back at the group’s experiences through its Instagram account @AmazonHealthcare.