Throughout November 2023, Smile Together once again supported the Oral Health Foundation and Mouth Cancer Foundation charities in raising awareness during Mouth Cancer Action Month (MCAM). Over the last year, 8,337 people in the UK were given the life-changing news that they have mouth cancer.
Early diagnosis vastly improves oral cancer survival rates, which is why it’s so important to have regular dental check-ups, self-check and seek help if you spot anything that isn’t normal for you.
Colleagues across Smile Together practice locations therefore used the opportunity to encourage our patients and colleagues to know how to spot mouth cancer early by regularly checking for any unusual changes in the mouth, and to ‘know your normal’!
They put up posters and created informative, engaging displays in waiting rooms explaining the risk factors, how to spot signs and symptoms and what to do if you think something’s not quite right. Colleagues went above and beyond this year utilising resources in the surgery to create really eye-catching displays. Our team in Newquay created little smiley faces made from surgical gloves, our team in Truro constructed the ‘blue ribbon’ mouth cancer badge out of surgical gloves, and our team in Bodmin built a whole new team member!
Many of our locations engaged in #BakeSomethingBlue, part of #BlueWednesday, and brought in brightly-coloured treats to sell with all proceeds going to charity. Outreach Dental Therapist Nat even sourced some Smile Together and Oral Health Foundation branded cupcakes which looked and tasted amazing! Nat said: “It was great to encourage our colleagues to #BakeSomethingBlue and fundraise for such a brilliant cause.”
Not only did colleagues bake something blue for Blue Wednesday they also donned blue lips, wore something blue and even did a spot of dancing! Dental Nurse Sarah said: “It was great to help spread awareness of oral cancer, and it was fun making the stand with other colleagues and doing a funny video for our social media channels. It is so important to engage people and we thought what better way to grab someone’s attention than by dancing with bright blue lips! I hope that we may have helped a few people gain knowledge of mouth cancer symptoms.”
We necessarily had multiple winners in our competition for the best and most informative display for MCAM this year! Our Bodmin team won the most ambitious display, Truro for the bake something blue challenge and Newquay for being the most ingenious, with extra certificates and goodies heading to Penzance and the Isles of Scilly teams for also getting involved.
We also had a visit from The Oral Health Foundation during our November 2023 #SmilesAtSeaUK harbourside tour to Hayle, creating and sharing this fabulous video with our Outreach Dental Therapist Nat to encourage regular checks for any unusual changes in the mouth and to ‘know your normal’. We hope it helps to make a difference, not just to those in fishing communities, and we were delighted to support the Oral Health Foundation and share this during MCAM.
Take a look at our Patient Hub for a wealth of information about dental treatments and oral health care. You can also see our ‘Checking for mouth cancer at sea’ video which we filmed during our 2022 #SmilesatSeaUK harbourside tour. Thanks to Mike from The Fishermen’s Mission for featuring in this and to SeaFit and Seafarers Hospital Society for their continued support.
