Dr Loc Lam (right) and Dr Laura Pham from Braddon Dental Surgery. Photo: Supplied.
While most people wouldn’t list a dental surgery as their favourite place to visit, one Canberra dentistry is helping people feel good when getting fillings by hosting charity days throughout the year.
Braddon Dental Surgery on Lonsdale Street is hosting its third charity day for the year today (10 July), with 100 per cent of all appointment fees going towards Sanjiwani Public Health Mission.
Sanjiwani provides health services to 6000 orphaned, disadvantaged and isolated villagers from Ghandruk in Nepal.
The surgery’s principal dentist and owner, Dr Loc Lam, has always considered herself lucky and privileged to have studied in Australia after coming here as a refugee from Vietnam in 1978. She opened Braddon Dental Surgery in 1991.
Her refugee background inspired her to want to give back to the community and led both her and dentist Dr Laura Pham to conduct charity work with the Children’s Health Aid Team in Vietnam and with the Sanjiwani Clinic in Nepal.
Dr Lam and her husband, John Guilfoyle, have worked closely with Sanjiwani for about five years, helping support both the health clinic and its health workers.
“Unfortunately, because of COVID, our trip to Nepal at the end of 2020 was unable to go ahead, so I thought of some other ways we could help out and make a difference,” Dr Lam said.
The Sanjiwani Public Health Mission provides medical care to 6000 villagers. Photo: Supplied.
The public health mission has been providing primary medical care to the villagers so they can avoid travel to larger cities as the country has suffered through a severe COVID-19 second wave.
The surgery previously raised more than $4000 for Karinya House in February and more than $2000 for Companion House, which assists torture and trauma survivors, in May.
Dr Pham said, “the best thing about it is you can finally feel good after going to see the dentist”.
For more information, visit www.braddondental.com.au.
To donate directly to Sanjiwani Public Health Mission or find out more about what they do, visit www.sanjiwani.net.au or www.givenow.com.au/sanjiwaniaustralia.
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