No Dentist! Medical Problems in Dentist-Free Districts Spreading in Hokkaido Free Denture Consultation" to help understand the situation in remote areas May 12 (Sun) at Sapporo Chikaho

Comfort Denture Clinic (Head Office: Sapporo, Hokkaido; President and Director: Akira Ikeda), a denture specialist, will hold a "Denture Consultation Session" on Sunday, May 12, 2024, at the Sapporo Ekimae-dori Underground Plaza Chikaho. The event will provide consultation on dislodged or painful dentures, and free storage of denture data in case of emergencies. One of the objectives of the event is to identify areas where it is difficult to go to the dentist's office, as the maintenance of medical care in areas without dentists is becoming a nationwide problem due to the aging of doctors and the disproportion of clinics in urban areas.

Denture Consultation at Chicaho

Denture consultation at Chicaho_2

The number of dentists alone is not enough to understand the spread of areas with no dentists in rural areas.

As the shortage of doctors continues to grow, the shortage of dentists in depopulated and remote areas, known as "dentistless districts," is also becoming more serious. Dentist-less districts are those where there are no dental facilities nearby, transportation is poor, and it is difficult to commute to medical facilities in other areas. Even in prefectures with a large number of dentists, there are many areas without dentists due to regional bias, such as concentration in urban areas, and the aging of doctors. Hokkaido is no exception, as there were 126 dentist-free districts in 2022, and many people commute to Sapporo City from Wakkanai City, Abashiri City, and other northern areas. It is said that perhaps because of the vast area, there are not many people who commute to dental clinics.

The number of people visiting from remote areas is increasing, and a realistic understanding of the current situation is necessary.

Comfort Denture Clinic, a denture specialist in Sapporo, will hold a denture consultation at "Chikaho. The event will be held in an underground shopping mall in the center of Sapporo, a place where locals and holiday visitors from faraway places can easily consult about small problems they are feeling on a daily basis. The purpose of the event is to identify areas where there are no nearby dental clinics, in addition to providing consultation services for denture pain and dislodged dentures.

The reason for holding the event was that patients had a hard time coming to the hospital during the heavy snowfall. Compared to the past, we now have more patients who come to our clinic from as far away as Wakkanai City and Monbetsu City. A woman in her 70s who lives near Wakkanai City has difficulty commuting by train, so she usually takes the expressway, a three-hour drive each way, to get to the clinic. However, the day before her appointment, it snowed heavily, so she took a bus and a cab for about 10 hours to get to the hospital. He said, "I can drive now, but I don't know how long I can keep going. He was anxious. We felt it was necessary to listen to the voices of the patients because we were going to a district where they could not go to even if they wanted to.

Children worry about their parents who live far away from them, and the unevenness of the community is an urgent issue.

We are currently planning to operate a mobile denture care bus that will go to areas where there are no dental clinics nearby or to remote areas to provide denture care and free data storage in a denture bank. The denture bank is a service that stores denture data free of charge in order to make new dentures in as little as two days in the event of a sudden denture loss due to disaster or routine loss, etc. Since its nationwide launch in 2023, 26 denture clinics in 17 prefectures have become members, and the service is expanding. The service was also included in the 2024 edition of the "Collection of Examples of Private Sector Initiatives for Strengthening the National Land Infrastructure" promoted by the Cabinet Secretariat.

Representative's voice: "In rural areas, parents often stay in their familiar places and their children often move to urban areas where there are jobs. If they are far away, it is not possible to take them to and from hospital visits as much as they would like. Concerned about their elderly parents who live far away from them, we have seen an increase in the number of consultations with denture banks that can store denture data free of charge. In some cases, daughters have brought their dentures to the bank for data storage. How to maintain medical care in remote areas, and regional bias, is an urgent issue."

Storing Data in Denture Banks

With the aging of the population, we will also promote the currently scheduled mobile bus service to protect the health of users by identifying and visiting areas that actually need denture treatment.

Outline of the denture consultation

Date: Sunday, May 12, 2024, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.

Location: Sapporo Ekimae-dori Underground Plaza, next to Exit 7 of Chikaho

Location ： Kita 1-jo Nishi 3-chome, Chuo-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-0001, Japan

Contents ：Consultation on denture pain and problems, free denture data storage (denture bank), etc.

Contact : Comfort Denture Clinic (TEL: 011-211-1418)

Akira Ikeda, Chairman and Director, Comfort Denture Clinic

Outline of Comfort Denture Clinic

Director： Akira Ikeda

Contents of practice : Denture fabrication and general denture-related treatment

Location: Tomii Building No. 2-12-2, Minami 2 Nishi 3-chome, Chuo-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido 060-0062, Japan

　　　　　　　 Tomii Building No.37 3F

Telephone number: 011-211-1000 (Office hours: Monday-Saturday 9:00-18:00)

Office Hours ： Mon-Fri, Sat every other week 9:00-18:00 (Closed on Sundays and National Holidays)

URL : https://comfortdc.com/