Dentsply Sirona, continuing its support for Smile Train, has started a local partnership with Indian treatment centres. This partnership will fund advanced training for Smile Train partner doctors, equipment donations to three Smile Train partner centres, as well as donating oral health kits for cleft patients. This comes as the partners are announced bronze winners of the 2024 Global Good Awards in the community partnership category.
Provision of advanced cleft care training and donation of dental equipment
The 2nd Advanced Training: Digitalisation in Cleft Orthodontics took place in New Delhi, India from 6-8 Dec. It educated 15 Smile Train partner doctors representing India, Nigeria, the Philippines, and Thailand on how to adopt the global digital cleft treatment protocols. The programme featured training on digital workflows in presurgical orthopedics, and mixed and permanent dentition, as well as hands-on workshops across three stages of treatment. This training programme was launched by Smile Train and Dentsply Sirona with dental professionals in Colombia earlier this year.
The equipment donated by Dentsply Sirona consists of two Primescan intraoral scanners, which will go to the Amandeep Healthcare and Ganga Medical Centre & Hospitals and one additional Primescan scanner, one Primeprint Solution 3D printer and one Axeos CBCT machine, which will go to the Shweta Dental Clinic. The donation also included sponsoring Smile Train training sessions that will empower more doctors to deliver quality digital cleft care to their communities. As a result, more patients from underserved communities in India will be able to access cleft treatment.
Furthermore, the Dentsply Sirona APAC leadership team prepared 150 oral health kits, which included a sustainable toothbrush, toothpaste, a timer, floss, an educational flyer on oral health best practices, as well as a personalised get-well card prepared by Dentsply Sirona employees. Each of the three Indian Smile Train Partner Centers received 50 of these kits for their patients.
Impactful partnership recognised by Global Good Awards
In recognition of the joint work Dentsply Sirona and Smile Train have done over the years to advance access and quality of cleft care for patients in need, the partners were recently awarded Bronze for community partnership of the year at the Global Good Awards 2024.
“Together with Smile Train, we have supported more than 3,800 life-changing cleft surgeries to patients in 15 countries over the last three years. We are incredibly proud of what we have achieved so far and delighted that our partnership has received recognition at the Global Good Awards,” said Andrea Frohning, SVP and chief human resources officer at Dentsply Sirona. “This motivates everyone at Dentsply Sirona to keep up the great work and go BEYOND for those in need.”
Dentsply Sirona’s sustainability strategy drives global impact
Dentsply Sirona’s ongoing support of Smile Train is part of the company’s sustainability strategy, “BEYOND: Taking action for a brighter world”, of which one focus is to increase access to healthcare in underserved communities. In 2021, Dentsply Sirona entered a five-year partnership with Smile Train to advance the future of cleft care and empower local medical professionals to deliver essential cleft care to their own communities.
In 2023, Smile Train and the FDI World Dental Federation launched, with Dentsply Sirona’s support, the first global standard protocols for digitalised cleft treatment, designed to improve the accuracy and efficacy of current treatments. To aid adoption, the partners also created a Digital Dentistry in Cleft Care MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) on how to utilise the protocols effectively.
“From providing high-quality cleft care to thousands of children around the world to empowering doctors to utilise leading digital technologies in their communities, our partnership with Dentsply Sirona is transforming cleft care globally,” said Mamta Carroll, Smile Train’s senior vice-president and regional director for Asia of Smile Train. “It is fantastic to see our partnership come to life in different corners of the world, and I am delighted that our joint work has been recognised by the Global Good Awards.”
