Ludhiana, September 9
The second dental health mela organised by Christian Dental College was inaugurated today by Mr Santokh Singh, Minister for Medical Education and Research, Punjab, on the college premises.
An on-the-spot poster competition on oral health for a healthy life for schoolchildren from various local schools was also inaugurated by the minister. In his inaugural address, Mr Santokh Singh lauded the efforts of the Christian Dental College for looking after the dental health of the poor people and providing them free dental check up and treatment during the mela. He stressed the need for oral hygiene.
Mr Santokh Singh further said the state government would improve the standards of medical and dental education in the medical and dental colleges for which Rs 50 crore had been
allotted during this financial year. He also announced a grant of Rs 41,000 for the development of CDC. The minister announced that the dental mechanics course would be given clearance and CDC could start the course from the next year. This year also over 100 persons had registered for free dentures so far.
Dr T.M. Jaison, acting director of Christian Medical College, expressed happiness over the various dental health education programmes, being carried out by the CDC.
While introducing the aims and objectives of the mela, Dr J.L. Joshi, Principal, CDC, and deputy director of CMC, revealed that the mobile dental services of CDC had been catering to villages around the city taking care of their dental needs with expert management, dental health education and training health volunteers to prevent and detect dental health related problems. For this, dental health camps were held at more than 90 different villages within a radius of about 70 km from the base apart from those at schools and colleges. Dr Joshi further said 98,340 schoolchildren under the school dental health services and 47,946 other persons people had so far been provided preventive and creative health services. In order to take care of senior citizens from low socio-economic groups, CDC had promised 149 full sets of dentures to poor people during the first dental health mela.
Dr Basant Pawar, Deputy Director, CMC, flagged off an oral hygiene and anti-tobacco rally from the college premises which passed through different areas in the city. It advocated the importance of oral hygiene and advised people to stop tobacco chewing. More than 500 school children from different schools participated in this rally.
Dr N.C. Mann, Senior Consultant, CDC, revealed that the high incidence and prevalence of dental diseases was due to ignorance of the people about the basic facts of oral health. Normal health could be attained by having good oral health through good oral hygiene.
Various competitions on oral health were also held. In the competition on oral hygiene and anti-tobacco rally, BCM School stood first, the second prize was given to Wylie School and third prize to SDP School.
In the on-the-spot competition, first prize was given to Harjeet Singh of GNI Public School and second and third prizes were won by Surbhi Goel of BCM Arya School and Satwanjit Kaur of GNI Public School, respectively. In the healthy teeth competition, the first prize went to Joshua of Wylie School, the second prize to Silky of BCM Arya School and third prize was given to Tanya from Wylie School. In the folk song competition, the first prize went to Wylie Memorial School and the second and third prizes were given to Wylie Memorial School and SDP School, respectively.
In the skit and play competition, the first prize went to BCM Arya Public School and second prize was won by Wylie Memorial School. An exhibition on oral health and a clinic on diet and nutrition was also held during the mela.
