Tim Shoda is hoping a yellow school bus will work some magic in Haiti in its new incarnation as a fully outfitted mobile dental clinic.
He, wife Karen, son Josh and about 100 volunteers from Jesus Way Christian Ministries toiled for seven months to transform a former school bus into a dental and medical center on wheels.
Now, the bus is being shipped to Haiti thanks to donations gathered by the Shallotte, N.C.-based ministry group.
Shoda said he initially purchased the school bus as a means to transport building supplies into the impoverished country, where he has volunteered since the 1970s. When Karen made her first mission trip to Haiti in 1989 with the dentist she worked for, she saw firsthand the immense need was for basic dental care. The couple started their own medical and dental ministry in 2001.
“My wife has been in dentistry for 30-plus years. Now she’s very involved in the missions ministry,” he said. “We collect donated supplies in our warehouse: generators, water purification systems, electrical supplies –– just basic things to sustain life.”
While discussing the bus with an associate in April, Shoda suddenly saw its potential as a dental clinic. The next step was to bring together the ministry’s medical coordinator, Barry Cape, with his associate, Justin, who had the engineering background to draft plans for the new interior.
“The bus has a lot of square footage. That’s how we got the idea,” said Shoda, who lives in Gainesville, Ga. “We had Justin work with Barry on designing the medical side of the bus…and I started raising the funds locally.”
Soon he was approached by another ministry program that was eager to pitch in, he said, and these 50 teenagers unbolted and removed all of the bus seats. Then his ministry team began the groundwork of collecting items to use in the clinic.
“We bought very few items for the structure in the bus. We hand-built the cabinets, but the countertops and shelving systems were donations — same with all the dental equipment, chairs, sinks, everything,” Shoda said, noting that the costliest investments were the air-conditioning and electrical systems. Additionally, it cost more than $10,000 just to ship the bus out of Miami.
In November, the Shodas and their dental and medical team will meet up with the school bus in Port-au-Prince. He said they were able to treat 600 medical patients and 250 dental patients during their last clinic stay, which required changing locations frequently.
“One of our reasons for wanting something mobile is that clean surfaces are impossible to find. We do not sacrifice cleanliness and sterilization when we do this,” he continued. “We provide the dentists with all the brand-new equipment they need to provide care.”
Added Shoda, “I’m hoping we can do setup in 30 minutes — that’s my goal — so we can treat more people.”
Shoda said the majority of their patients are children, who learn how to do preventive care like brushing and flossing. The ministry team provides the toothbrushes, toothpaste and fluoride to make their smiles shine brighter. School buses are ideal for their work in Haiti, he explained, because they can be processed through a smaller shipping port and bypass the politics and corruption. Shoda has already issued a request for another school bus to use in Haiti, this one for transportation.
“Hopefully, we’ll have it next year,” he added. “This is an ongoing process for us. This is not a one-time deal for our ministry.”
