Oregon Dental Foundation Awards Grant to sole dental provider to the Oregon Health Plan

“The Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Clinic is honored to be the recipient of a $5,000 grant from the Oregon Dental Foundation,” says Diana Walker, the new executive director of the Virginia Garcia Memorial Foundation. “This generous grant goes to help support the expansion and operational needs of our new Hillsboro clinic and we are very grateful to the Oregon Dental Foundation.”

The clinic is due to open in June 2007 and will provide dental services to low-income and Oregon Health Plan patients. Although this is the third Virginia Garcia dental facility, dental services are very limited for Oregon Health Plan patients.

This grant will also continue the Oregon Dental Foundation’s objective to ‘provide emergency dental care for people who are disadvantaged and have no access to care’ as well as to help ‘prevent dental disease through dental health education to the community.’

Children are particularly impacted by the presence of the Virginia Garcia dental clinics. These clinics provide a positive dental experience and dental hygiene education to disadvantaged children which will shape their entire dental future.

Dr. Serena Mull of the McMinnville Virginia Garcia Dental Clinic is particularly proud of how the Virginia Garcia dental staff is able to impact the lives of children, leading to better dental hygiene for life. Lack of contact with proper dental care and dentists often lead to aversion and fear of what will happen in a dental visit.

In fact, this fear brought a 10 year old boy to tears in his first visit to the dentist. Dr. Mull says, “With gentle persuasion he was able to come through all of his dental visits with flying colors.” Dr. Mull also told him to “spread the word” about the positive experience he had at Virginia Garcia to help ease the anxiety of other children. Because of Dr. Mull’s ability to overcome this child’s fear of the dentist, he is more likely to seek out routine dental care.

Many of the children who come into the clinics have not had access to things many of us take for granted, such as a toothbrush for every member of a family. By the time some of the children arrive at the Virginia Garcia Clinics, many of their teeth are already decayed thereby impacting their overall health and their ability to do well in school.

About Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center

Since 1975, Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center has worked toward the vision that no one in Washington and Yamhill Counties lacks basic health care. The clinic was founded to honor the life and death of six-year old Virginia Garcia, who sustained a treatable foot wound while working in the fields with her migrant farm worker parents. Although attempts were made to treat her, the unavailability of cultural, economic and language-appropriate medical services ultimately led to her death.

While retaining it’s root mission of meeting the needs of migrant and seasonal farm workers and their families, Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center now serves people from many cultural, linguistic, and vocational backgrounds, all of whom share one important characteristic: without the health care they receive from Virginia Garcia, they simply would not get the treatment or preventative care they need. With clinics in Beaverton, Cornelius, Hillsboro, and McMinnville, Virginia Garcia Memorial Health Center is dedicated to providing accessible, high-quality, culturally appropriate health care to low-income and uninsured residents of Washington and Yamhill counties. In the coming fiscal year, the Center will provide primary health care, prenatal and obstetric care, dental services, and health education to approximately 30,000 individuals.

About the Oregon Dental Foundation

The Oregon Dental Foundation was established in 1982 to improve the lives of Oregonians by increasing the quality and quantity of dental health, education and scientific knowledge.

The Foundation funds programs such as non-profit clinics and other facilities that provide dental care to the disadvantaged. They also underwrite educational opportunities that provide a broader understanding and greater enhancement of the art and science of dentistry. The Foundation supports organizations dedicated to provide information to the public that would elevate dental health.

The Oregon Dental Foundation is a permanent endowment supported through individuals and organizations both within and outside the dental community. The ODS Companies is a major corporate donor who awarded the Oregon Dental Foundation a grant of $1 million in 1997.

The Oregon Dental Foundation is an affiliate member of the Oregon Community Foundation. ODF is governed and grants are awarded by a board of volunteer dentists and public members are elected by the Board of trustees of the Oregon Dental association.

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