A young Kopan Team Sept 2025

Project Yeti continues to thrive, with groups of mainly dentists visiting in September 2024 and April and September 2025. The teams have an international flavour, with Lithuanian dentists visiting in April this year, together with some British dental students alongside Australian dentists, and in September we had a group of 10 dentists, two from Australia, one from Germany who currently resides in Australia, one from Croatia and 6 from Germany, including three students on their electives. The German contingent had heard about Project Yeti from an article written by the two Germans from September 2024. I had the privilege of coordinating the group. In addition, two teams went to Chialsa, in April and October.

In September, with the approval of the headmaster of the monks’ school, we were able to go into the classrooms of the earliest years, to give talks on the importance of oral hygiene. This was a great success, for both the students and the dentists. The little monks loved having their teeth ‘painted purple’ and then cleaning them. Of one of our group improvised with some wonderful cardboard working models of teeth, together with some detachable broccoli! We are hoping to build on this success and visit the classrooms on our next visit, and hopefully we will be able to do the same with the young nuns.

Over a period of two weeks in early September, we performed many forms of treatment, including restorative work and the surgical removal of lower third molars, Over 100 checkups were done, with other preventative measures, and fluoride and fissure sealing for the younger monks. We were also able to do endodontic treatment and the students in particular were thrilled that they were able to extract some teeth (under supervision).

On our days off, and after work we explored downtown Kathmandu. One of the highlights was visiting Durbar square in the historic city, Bhaktapur.

Team managed by Dr Janet Scott