MED and GSDM Join Forces to Secure Dental Floss Donation

GSDM Global & Population Health Administrative Manager Sharon Boyle accepted the donation. (l-r) Library Director Mary Blanchard, Sharon Boyle, A’Llyn Ettien, and Head of Reference & Electronic Collections Management Joseph Harzbecker
GSDM Global & Population Health Administrative Manager Sharon Boyle accepted the donation. (l-r) Library Director Mary Blanchard, Sharon Boyle, A’Llyn Ettien, and Head of Reference & Electronic Collections Management Joseph Harzbecker

What can you do with five giant bags full of dental floss? Plenty, when you’re organizing international elective externships.

GSDM Global & Population Health is the recipient of that very gift from the Dental Section of the Medical Library Association (MLA), which sought to donate supplies to a worthy cause in honor of its 80th anniversary this year.

Celebration organizer Beth Mamo began the search in November 2012 for a cause local to Boston, the location of the 2013 MLA Annual Meeting from May 3-8. Mamo contacted MLA member and Head of Technical Services at the BU Alumni Medical Library on the Medical Campus, A’Llyn Ettien, for suggestions, and Ettien reached out to GSDM.

“Since the MLA meeting this year had an international theme,” Ettien says, “the members chose to collect supplies for dental students going on international missions.”

Assistant Director of Global & Population Health Kathy Held says, “Large quantities of dental floss are hard to come by but relatively easy to transport, so it’s a great item to collect for students travelling to other countries on externships.”

“I sincerely thank the MLA, as well as Ms. Ettien and the members of GSDM Global & Population Health, for securing this important donation,” says Dean Jeffrey W. Hutter. “We at GSDM greatly appreciate this generous support of our efforts to improve global oral health.”

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