In 2017 two charities, Crisis and Den-Tech came together for the first time to pilot a same day denture service for their homeless guests.
Crisis, the national charity for the homeless have been running a clinical dental service since 1995 but has never had a dental laboratory facility whereas Den-Tech is a charity set up specifically to provide a lab service which would complement and complete the treatment offered such by such a service so the two seemed perfectly matched.
The pilot lab was set up on site at Crisis’s North London rough sleepers’ facility and in 2017 over the course of the Christmas week it provided 24 same day dentures for 21 homeless guests.
2018, the second year of Den-Tech and Crisis’s collaboration to provide quick turnaround, same day dentures for the homeless has proved even more successful. Building on the success of the pilot collaboration the year before and learning the lessons from the previous year the team have managed to make a total of 31 dentures for 24 patients, with an average turnaround time of 3.5 hours.
This charity/service could not run without the kindness and generosity of its donors and volunteers and the trustees and I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has donated equipment, consumables, time, effort or money.
To register your interest in getting involved with this and to be one of the first to be alerted when the official registration for the Christmas events opens go to the volunteer with us page and fill in your details.