It's not every day that 1,000 people line up for hours to have surgery in the basement of a convention center, waiting to lie side-by-side in dental chairs in an open room.
But for those 1,000 people, the promise of surgery and other dental procedures can be a blessing.
Lashunda Thrower, 41, had a cavity on a top, right tooth in the back of her mouth and part of a front, top tooth missing from an accident while biting into food.
"The pain would come and go," she said. Months would pass without an ache. "Then for weeks at za time -- throbbing pain."
On Friday, Thrower drove from Hot Springs at 3 a.m. with three other people to attend the first day of the Arkansas Mission of Mercy's free, two-day dental clinic at the Statehouse Convention Center in downtown Little Rock.
They arrived about 4 a.m. and still had to stand behind more than 200 people who had already arrived. Some patients lined up overnight, waiting to see a dentist.
Thrower got the back tooth filled and, to her surprise, the front tooth filled, too.
"I'm happy," she said, smiling, relieved that her front tooth didn't need to be pulled.
Thrower, sitting in her black hat, black sweatshirt and jeans, touched her face over and over again, checking to see if she was still numb.
The annual clinic -- in its ninth year -- serves about 2,000 patients each year adults and children, on a first-come, first-served basis.
Most of the patients the clinic volunteers serve haven't had regular dental care. They can't afford insurance, can't afford more serious procedures or don't have a dentist nearby whom they can regularly visit.
Arkansas has a dentist shortage, mostly in the southern half of the state, and some counties don't have dentists at all, according to Arkansas Oral Health Plan. The organization is working toward establishing the state's first dental school and for providing loan repayments or loan forgiveness to dental school graduates from the state who agree to practice in a "dentally underserved area, or to serve an underserved population."
Thrower has dental insurance from her job at Berry Plastics but said she didn't want to pay hundreds of dollars for two fillings.
"I left my husband. I'm a single mother," she said.
Arkansas Mission of Mercy estimates that the free dental procedures performed since 2007 have totaled $7.1 million worth of work.
Time and supplies are donated by the state Dental Association -- which started the clinic -- Delta Dental of Arkansas, the Walmart Foundation and others. About 900 volunteers -- many who are dentists and many who aren't -- will participate this weekend.
The event mostly serves adults but also has a children's unit, along with comfort dogs for those who are afraid of seeing the dentist.
On Friday morning, two volunteers led a basset hound and a terrier down the long hallway outside the clinical area.
"There's a little girl who's shaky," another volunteer said to them, as they sauntered off to the children's area.
Patients waited outside the Statehouse Convention Center before they could be taken inside and downstairs to wait yet again.
When spots opened up inside the clinic area, patients were taken there to wait again.
Then they were taken to report their medical history to volunteers, then have their blood pressure and blood sugar tested. Next was a dental triage area, where hygienists determined what kind of work patients needed.
Most of the time, patients need to have teeth pulled or filled, said Dr. Don Perkins, a member of the Arkansas Mission of Mercy, who was was president of the state Dental Association when the group decided to start the free clinic. On Friday, Perkins was in charge of the numbing station, where patients have their mouths treated with novocaine behind black curtains.
Volunteers described the work as pain relief and preventive care so that people with infected teeth don't end up going to the emergency room.
Many people have several teeth pulled, if not most of their teeth. The words "full mouth extraction" can be heard and several people could be found Friday morning with bloody gauze clenched in their mouths that their relatives said was between a single row of teeth and a row of just gums.
The clinic doesn't have full dentures to give people to replace their lost teeth. In the past few years it has offered a limited number of partial dentures to replace a tooth or two in the front of someone's smile.
One person Perkins treated was lucky enough to receive a partial denture.
She cried, he said.
"Made me cry, too," he said, "but that's what it's all about."
Donny Anderson, 28, who rode with Thrower to Little Rock, had one tooth pulled in the back, top row.
It wasn't replaced.
"I feel 10 times better," he said.
Sometimes getting the bad teeth out is better than leaving them in just so a person can have a full set of teeth, Dr. Mark Murphy said.
"This setting is not full-mouth rehab," he said, noting that not having full dentures was not ideal and that the event just doesn't have the resources to provide dentures.
Anderson, smiling in his white T-shirt and black track pants, said he was glad he came.
He just started a job at Burger King in Hot Springs and didn't think he had dental insurance to take care of the tooth that had been nagging him.
Thrower felt the same satisfaction.
"It's a blessing," she said. "It's a blessing."
Metro on 05/16/2015