We always like to hear from customers who appreciate the skill and craftsmanship that goes into making our products and the resulting quality of those devices. Sometimes we get this feedback from unexpected places. One recent response was from some folks at Mabel’s Free Clinic, or La Clinica Gratis de Mabel as it is known as in Nuevo Progresso, Mexico. As the name says, Mabel’s is a free clinic serving indigent children and adults in this community just across the U.S./Mexico border. It is essentially a volunteer operation managed by the Mabel’s Free Clinic Association of Weslaco, TX.
A few days ago, we had an opportunity to speak with Dick Turner, the clinic director, and Bob Drasner, a board member and self-proclaimed kitten herder. They told us that, on an annual basis, Mabel’s Free Clinic treats 800 to 900 dental patients, about 600 to 700 medical patients and performs just under 100 eye surgeries. They also service 14 area schools providing free eye and teeth examinations, and dispense reground donated glasses from the Lion’s Club.
A lot of the eye surgeries they do are for “surfers eye”, officially known as pterygium, for which Dr. Hans Khan of Mission, TX, uses Bovie’s Aaron Ophthalmic burr handle and burr tips. What we heard from Bob and Dick, who work closely with Dr. Khan, is that this burr system is “an absolute work of art”. Bob explained that the burr handle itself has to be absolutely dead straight with absolutely no wobble; and that the burr tips also must be precisely rounded in order to provide the precision desired by the surgeon, and the outcome desired by patient and the clinic.
The Aaron ophthalmic burr handle is a small surgical steel, battery operated device that is ergonomically designed, and easily held in the hand for precise control and operation. The Aaron Burr 2 comes with a disposable 1 mm burr tip [0001] for corneal rust ring removal, a "AA" alkaline battery and a foam-lined case. A diamond burr tip [0011] may be purchased separately for polishing the pterygium bed after surgical removal and for lid margin lesions [1/box]. The burr tips range from the standard 1mm tip to a 2.5mm diamond tip and a 5.0mm diamond tip.
Mabel’s Free Clinic has been serving the dental needs of the members of this community, and some who come from as far as 100 miles away, since 1998 as a strictly volunteer organization. They expanded their scope of services to include eye surgery about 10 years ago, thanks to Dr. Kahn who specializes in third world medicine and comes to do cataract, pterygium and other eye surgeries twice a month.
Anyone interested in volunteering and donating are encouraged to get in contact with Dick Turner or go online at www.mabelsclinic.net. According to Bob, everyone that comes to volunteer their work at Mabel’s says that it was, “an extremely positive experience.”
