Five-year-old Cory Elyasevich emerged from his first visit to the dentist with two plastic toys from the office treasure chest, a complimentary toothbrush and a smile.
No tears from the kindergarten student at Shiloh Park School in Zion, who only had to walk down the hall from his classroom for his appointment at the Lind Memorial Dental Clinic, a one-chair operation next to the school nurse’s office.
The clinic is open to Zion and Benton Township families who meet certain income qualifications, said Karen Fink, president of Zion-Benton Children’s Service, which sponsors the clinic.
This is the first week the clinic has been back in operation since school resumed last month. During the school year, students as young as 4 and as old as 18 troop through the door at half-hour intervals, five days a week.
Last year, the tiny clinic, which opened in 1973, logged 1,126 appointments, said Dee Potocek, the clinic’s manager. Some type of dental care for youngsters from low-income households has been available to residents of the townships since the 1940s, she added.
Filling cavities and providing protective treatment are among the most common procedures at the clinic, although the patients bring a range of problems to the dentist’s chair.
“Some need very minimal work and some need almost full-mouth reconstruction,” Dr. Roberta Wisun said.
“When you walk in most dentist’s offices, the children are crying because they are scared,” said parent Milton Moreland of Zion. “I haven’t heard any crying, so I guess they’re doing a good job.”
His son, Bryan Reynolds, 9, enjoyed his first visit to the clinic so much he demanded to know when his return visit was scheduled, Moreland said.
Cory’s mother, April Dubois of Zion, said she has been taking his 11-year-old brother to the clinic for years. “They do a great job,” she said.”I’ve never heard any complaints from my older son.”
Some parents pay nothing for the dental service, while others pay a maximum of $5 per child for each visit, Fink said. Emergency cases, such as when a child chips a tooth on the playground, are also seen by the staff dentists. Those cases cost $10, Fink said.
“We really think we do a service for the education of each child,” Fink said. “A child in class with a toothache isn’t going to be learning.”
Even children who are not eligible to be treated at the clinic learn about dental health when their classes visit for talks by the dentists who work there, juggling a couple of days at the clinic with their own private practices in either Gurnee or Milwaukee.
“It’s fun to work with the children, and it’s certainly a challenge,” said Wisun, who has worked at the clinic for four years and also works for a private practice in Milwaukee.
The dentists go through a three-month trial to make sure they are well-suited to dealing with young patients all day.
“You have kids who are afraid of being here, afraid of needles, and some of them just don’t know what to expect,” Potocek, the clinic’s manager, said.
As are adult patients, the youngsters are most afraid of the unknown, Wisun said.
“I always explain everything I do before I do it,” she said. “It’s just better that people know what’s going to be done to them.”
