Medical students organized a nationwide roadshow “Together for a healthy and beautiful smile”

    The 9th year of the bigest preventive event in the field of oral health for the general public, Together For Healthy And Beautiful Smile, organized by students of the Faculty of Medicine, UPJŠ culminated in Košice on Sunday, September 12, 2021. The event started on September 2, 2021 in Bratislava and continued in the following days in Trnava, Nitra, Piešťany, Bojnice, Trenčín, Zvolen, Žilina, Banská Bystrica, Liptovský Mikuláš, Hrebienok, Poprad, Spišská Nová Ves, Bardejovské Kúpele, Michalovce, Svidník, Prešov and Košice.
    The city of Košice was purposely chosen as the last stop of the roadshow, together with the end date of the whole event, because September 12 is the European Day of Oral Health and Košice is the city where the main organizers of this big roadshow study – so they wanted to finish the event right here.

    “The main idea of the event was to raise awareness among the general public about the importance of maintaining oral hygiene and preventing tooth decay, gingivitis, and other diseases of the oral cavity due to lack of care. We are very pleased to have trained a total of 7945 people of all ages in eighteen cities. We consider it a great success, to which the beautiful weather also contributed. This year was really hot and even though it was difficult for us to work in such hot weather, there were a lot of people in the streets, they were in a good mood and willing to join us,” says Katarína Vendeľová, a student of the 3rd year of the study programme Dental Medicine in the Slovak Language at the FM UPJŠ, who serves as the Secretary of the Slovak Association of Dental Students.
    It is gratifying for students to find that people’s theoretical knowledge in the field of oral health is improving every year, “but there are still relatively large gaps in the practical part. Whether it’s the wrong holding of the brush, the bad inclination of the bristles and also many people do not use interdental aids that significantly help oral hygiene, or use them incorrectly and therefore ineffective,” notes Samuel Tkáč, a student of the 3rd year of the study programme Dental Medicine in the Slovak Language at the FM UPJŠ and National Coordinator of the Slovak Association of Dental Students for Prevention.

---