A PASSION for the industry has led an Orange dentist to become the president of the NSW Australian Dental Association.
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Dr Sabrina Manickam, who works in a private practice in town and is the head of discipline-dentistry at Charles Sturt University (CSU) said she wanted to focus on regional access to dentists and promote and educate people about oral health issues.
“There’s a couple of things I want to look at, one of many things is I want to engage with the community and a number of organisations that share a common view with us to improve oral health in the community and also general health,” she said.
“Certainly in regional NSW we have issues for access. We need better direction and be able to provide them [regional residents] with the care that for a long time has not been easy to access.
“Rural and regionally it’s about improving services. That’s not to say they aren’t around but it’s how to service them.”
Dr Manickam said it was also important to make sure patients were educated about oral health, including brushing, the effect of what they eat and why they should visit the dentist.
Although her new role means she has to take a statewide view, Dr Manickam hopes there will be benefits for people in Orange as well.
She has lived here for about 15 years and says she has been part of the CSU program “since it was a hole in the ground”.
“Anything that I think increases the profile of dentistry here is a good thing, if my role of president promotes oral health that’s a good thing,” she said.
“We’re about to start our enrolment process for the new students of 2016, numbers are good, we are [teaching] 45 this year, it’s still a very popular course. It’s a really exciting time for dentistry and there’s lots of great changes.”
Dr Manickam was voted as president on September 25 and has also previously held several executive roles with the association, including vice president.
tanya.marschke@fairfaxmedia.com.au