Crisis is a charity that helps single homeless people all year round and last Christmas for the 39th consecutive year it opened its doors in a specific campaign that has become known as Crisis Christmas.
From 23-30 December, nine centres in London welcomed almost 2,000 homeless people who, as well as taking advantage of warm meals, companionship and accommodation, were also able to access other essential services and learning resources.
The Christmas campaign is made possible through the generosity of Crisis’ partners and supporters and Henry Schein have established an excellent relationship with the Charity.
So in 2009 as in the previous four years, a team from Henry Schein joined over 8,000 other volunteers and for the first time all three divisions of the Henry Schein Group were involved; dental, medical and veterinary, the latter supplying collars and leads for many of the guests’ dogs.
One of the services offered by Crisis is access to dental facilities and Henry Schein arranges and co-ordinates the set-up and close-down of two dental units located at one of the Crisis centres.
Each unit is staffed by fully qualified volunteer dentists and support staff, who are organised into teams working on a rota basis to ensure constant and consistent service throughout the whole week.
Treatments range from basic oral care and hygiene to more severe cases requiring root canal therapy and extractions. In 2009, a total of 270 treatments were performed by the dental teams on site.
Henry Schein supplies dentists through Henry Schein Minerva, doctors through Porter Nash Medical and veterinarians through Dunlops.
Crisis run campaigns throughout the year aimed at bringing the plight of homeless people to the attention of government and the public, to volunteer or donate please visit www.crisis.org.uk.
