Homes in the five villages we serve have no indoor plumbing or running water. Although electricity came to the village in 2014, most families can't afford it.

When we began working to build the school, we quickly discovered that no one had toothbrushes, toothpaste, or healing ointments like Neosporin, and doctors, dentists, and hospitals were impossibly far away. I still remember the moment we suddenly realized that we hadn't seen a single villager wearing glasses. Chronic diarrhea from drinking unclean water is a common ailment in all families.

Each year we fund basic medical supplies for the school such as anti-bacterial ointment, bandaids, antiseptic spray, diarrhea medicine, and flu and fever remedies. We also give each student a toothbrush, toothpaste, shampoo and soap. Teachers use disclosing tablets to teach pre-school, elementary and our middle school students proper brushing techniques. During our first visit to the school, we showed classes a toothbrush and asked them if they had ever seen one and whether they knew what it was used for. None knew. 

To assist the community, we created the following initiatives to improve the health of village families.

Eyeglass Clinic

We searched for a vision clinic online and found a Colorado non-profit organization called Seeing Is Believing whose mission is to provide vision screening and custom eyeglasses to Cambodian and Laotian villagers: http://www.seeingisbelieving.vision/.  

Dental Clinics

For the past five years, we have been fortunate to hold bi-annual dental clinics sponsored by Project Cambodia, a dental program for Cambodian village families created and supported by the Australian non-profit organization, Buddhist Library and Meditation Centre: https://youraid.org.au