Day 52 - Sustainability

My main focus today was on sustainability. I am really proud of the work I have done over the past eight weeks, so I want to ensure that all of my efforts continue even as I head back to school and the SEARHC staff goes back to their day-to-day routine. It is easy for a project to gain momentum when an unpaid, hard-working (sometimes) intern is dedicating nearly forty hours per week to a specific task, but it becomes a completely different dynamic when I pass off my project to somebody who may have other job responsibilities.

For this reason, I spent today focusing on how to make sure my project is sustainable. One of the main ways that I am going to do this is to develop a strong foundation of researched materials to leave in a database before I leave. I have focused on four main research topics: nutrition, vertical transmission, newborn child's dental timeline, and the correlation between a mother's oral health and her child's oral health. This material should get the SEARHC staff through the first few months after I leave as they adjust to finding the correct staff members to be in charge of the patient education material, how they will fit these new responsibilities into their schedule, and how efficiently and effectively the distribution of patient education material goes.

Also, today brought some excitement as the Xyltiol products for the vending machine finally arrived. Almost seven weeks ago I spent an entire afternoon finding gums and mints with a high concentration of Xyltiol and making sure that we had products that fit in the large slots and products that fit in the small slots in the vending machine. If you are at work or school tomorrow and stop by the vending machine at lunch, know that a lot more thought goes into the placement of the Reese's Cups than you would have ever imagined! Tomorrow we are going to the bank to pick up quarters, dimes, and nickels so that we can stock the machine the appropriate amount of change. Dr. Hort and I are also going to start pricing the items and loading them into the vending machine. The vending machine will be fully functional by the time that I leave, which is another exciting accomplishment.

For dinner tonight I went over to Dr. Nascimento's with Dr. Dee, the Wilkinsons, and Dr. Marcotte. Dr. Nascimento is one of those people that excels at everything she does. Over the past few months I have seen her teach herself to sew, paint, carve, and crochet without so much as batting an eyelid. Tonight, she cooked dinner without the aid of a recipe book and the food was so good we had to cut our card game short because we were all too stuffed full and tired. As we sat and ate I started to get a little sentimental knowing that I will be leaving this group soon. The project has not only exceeded my expectations through my community service, but socially as well. I never could have imagined that I would meet so many people who would make my summer in Alaska so enjoyable.

Another full day tomorrow. Time is winding down...