Mobile Dental Clinic arrives at Foxton Primary School

17/03/2010 | Mobile Dental Clinic at Foxton Primary School

The first double mobile dental clinic arrived at Foxton Primary School on Monday morning.

Reverend Kahu Durie blessed the clinic which received a warm welcome from Foxton Primary School students and staff. Dental Therapists Leanne Harrison and Beth Farrell as well as Dental Assistant Margaret Macdonald will begin seeing students from 16 March 2010.

Foxton Primary School has 75 students who will each be seen in the dental clinic. Principal Ani Ruahihi welcomed the new clinic and thanked MidCentral for bringing it to the school. She said this was a new day for the school and that each class would have a chance to look around the clinic and become comfortable with it. The clinic will be there for about two weeks and then move on to another school in the area.

MidCentral Health Child Adolescent Oral Health Project manager Kate Aplin said: “The response from schools in the region to receiving the mobile dental clinics has been extremely positive with a willingness to discuss how the Child Adolescent Oral Health Service and the school can improve the oral health status within the MidCentral DHB region.”

A further double mobile dental clinic is due to arrive at Palmerston North Hospital campus for acceptance testing this week. Meanwhile, the DHB is continuing its investigations into providing universal access in the future.

There is one dental chair in the single mobile units and two dental chairs in the double mobile units. The dental chairs are highly technical chairs which the client sits in while receiving oral health care. They are the key component to this service, along with modern equipment cleaning areas and digital x-ray.

The clinics have been equipped so that each Dental Therapist will be able to see approximately 55 children a week. There is a small increase in clinical staff (Dental Therapists and Assistants) in the reconfigured service. A major change is that Dental Therapists will no longer have to work by themselves due to having a colleague in the two chair clinics, as well as a Dental Assistant in single and double chair clinics.

The Ministry of Health, in conjunction with the NZ Dental Therapists Association, provides guidelines for the number of patients a Dental Therapist is able to work with each year and from this the number of chairs required is worked out.

Consideration of the oral health status in different areas is also used in this equation to ensure that where there are areas of high oral health need, there are enough Dental Therapists and chairs to accommodate this.

Any dental work that requires sedation will be undertaken in the MidCentral District Health Board’s dental unit at Palmerston North Hospital.

Updates, project documentation and progress is available from the MidCentral District Health Board website: http://www.midcentraldhb.govt.nz/oral-health


Jack Peta addressing the school and attending guests and welcoming the new clinic.

Contact: Communications Unit (06) 350-8945