Dental hygiene students in Leeza Dougherty’s Seniors Health Policy and Health Advocacy class delivered their final projects to a special audience member this week. St. Catharines MPP Jennie Stevens visited the Welland campus, August 14, to hear proposals the students have been working on all term for their final project.
“Bringing a politician in makes things more realistic,” Dougherty said of the visit. “[The students] are very passionate about their oral health topics and if they are placed into the right hands, change could actually happen.”
Students were required to choose an advocacy topic during the first week of the course, then spent the next seven weeks conducting research for a research paper.
“In the back end of the course, they formulate a proposal to an individual–usually politicians–to make the needed change for their topic,” Dougherty said. “Then they present their topics to the class and there is time for debate.”
She said many of the students had never had the opportunity to have a real debate or speak with a politician. Having Stevens in the class gave the students a real-life experiential learning experience.
It also gave Stevens a chance to learn about the oral health needs of her constituents.
“She may take away some topics and bring them to the right people to initiate change,” Dougherty said.
“This type of assignment is important because it teaches us how to take the steps of making change at a political level,” said student Rachel Hamm. “Having these skills allows us to advocate for ourselves as health care professionals and continually improve our practice and the quality of care the public receives.”
Hamm’s group advocated for a change in legislation to allow dental hygienists to administer local anesthetic (LA) in Ontario, which she says would benefit dental practices and the public.
“Dental hygienists develop a connection with their clients; the client places trust in them to care for their oral health,” Hamm said. “Since we have developed this rapport, people tend to have a more comfortable experience when dental hygienists administer the LA.”
Her group also reasoned that by allowing dental hygienists to administer LA, it would improve office efficiency by reducing time waiting for the dentist and allow hygienists to provide care to individuals in remote areas or to those with additional barriers to accessing dental care.
Adriana Sansotta, whose group advocated for oral health in correctional facilities, said she and her peers collaborated with the University of British Columbia for their research paper.
Fourth-year dental hygiene students there had already done work with the Elizabeth Fry Society of Greater Vancouver to provide dental care for women and their children transitioning from the prison system back into society, Sansotta said.
“We chose the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre as our test jurisdiction,” she explained. “The overall goal of our project was to determine the long-term benefits of oral health prevention and promotion initiatives to inmate health during and after incarceration, and cost savings for members of the public, government and health care system.”
Sansotta said the program focused on implementing three oral health strategies: accessibility to free oral hygiene aids, diets supported by dentally informed nutritionists and accessibility to routine dental hygiene preventative care at a clinic on-site.
“Considering the rates of dental disease are high among inmates and the focus is primarily on emergency care, we were advocating for a focus on prevention so we could be proactive at preventing disease and preserving healthy smiles, which have further long-term effects on housing security, employment and education opportunities following incarceration,” she said.
Both Sansotta and Hamm said they received positive feedback on their presentations, and that advocacy assignments like this one are important to draw awareness to dental health issues that affect the entire population, and to think more critically about the social detriments of health.
“We are able to investigate the political, social, and economic impacts relative to oral health promotion initiatives and the unique experiences that various populations must deal with, and how we might positively support them,” Sansotta said.
“It’s helpful to present to our peers, as they often share different perspectives and sometimes even challenge your current thought process,” Hamm added.
Stevens said she was impressed with all the advocacy initiatives, adding: “Their emphasis on equity, access, and overall health speaks to the quality of the programming at Niagara College.
“I especially loved hearing about how many of these projects stemmed from their real-life experiences in Niagara, many of which were from the dental clinic on-campus and their other experiential learning experiences throughout their studies.”
Dougherty said she, too, thought the presentations were well done.
“The students did amazing presenting their projects to Jennie and (Dean, Community Services, Justice and Fitness Studies) Carol Phillips,” Dougherty said. “Jennie had great feedback and said she wanted to bring some of this information to her colleagues to maybe make a change. The students received her feedback and questions well and were very articulate with their responses.
“You could see the passion the students have about their topics.”
