Message to the Uninsured: 'Smile, It's Free'

When dental assistant Rick Barbour showed up to volunteer his services at a free clinic this weekend, he had no idea how he would be needed. But everything came together as soon as soon as he met Debra Boehm of Des Moines.

Moments into a conversation with Boehm, he offered to provide her with a free set of dentures. Inspired by the generosity, Dr. Brad Richtsmeier, one of the organizers of the clinic, offered to pull Boehm’s remaining teeth and recontour the bone for a better fit. In a few hours, they provided her combined services valued at around $6,500.

Boehm’s tears punctuated her grateful response to Barbour: “I thank God for you.”

Dr. Mindy Richtsmeier, Brad’s wife and the other organizer of the clinic, can’t stop smiling as she recounts how they helped provide almost $50,000 in free dental care to 106 Iowa residents last weekend. .

Erin Kiley, who used to be adjunct English professor in Virginia before moving back in with her parents this year, was one of Mindy’s patients. Kiley said she hadn’t had a cleaning since 2007 because dental insurance wasn’t a benefit in her former job.

"I've taken so much care of my teeth all these years," she says, smiling broadly. Currently unemployed, Kiley says she’s stepped up her personal-care routine as compensation, but allows that “it’s frustrating to know there are probably bad things happening there.”

Richtsmeier says she understands: Dental care is expensive. “It’s hard, especially when you don’t have insurance, to find that money in your savings account because there are so many other areas in your life where that money is needed,” she said. “I hear that a lot from people.”

Big and small moments made Dentistry from the Heart, a national nonprofit program, worth repeating, she says.

“I have to do this,” Barbour said. “I have something in my heart and can’t not do his.”

Mindy remembers one man in particular who swallowed volunteers in hugs and thanked them for “not only giving him the care he needed, but doing it in a way that allowed him to maintain his dignity.”

Some of those seen during the clinic suffered from oral disease, but many were just people who had to give up  regular doctor visit when the economy soured. "It just reaffirms the whole reason we did this," Mindy Richtsmeier says.

As in Georgia, the effort had religious roots: The Richtsmeiers say they developed a passion for volunteerism during their time with Mission of Mercy, a statewide free dental clinic serving hundreds of Iowans. This was their weekend to manage the volunteer work themselves and “call the shots,” as Mindy says.

The next job for Mindy is planning fwhat she and her partners at of West Des Moines will do differently in next year’s clinic.

For starters, they’ll have more instruments on hand -- a necessity, Mindy says, since the number of folks in need of care have increased with unemployment and a corresponding loss of dental insurance.

“It’s really important to give back,” she said. “It’s what makes all things worthwhile, especially when there is a need.”