Volume 8 • 2021 • Issue 3

Dentists’ Experiences as Vaccinators Dentists are being welcomed among the ranks of health care personnel administering vaccines in some provinces. Dr. Joel Antel of Winnipeg and Dr. Bruce Yaholnitsky of Calgary spoke to CDA about their experiences administering COVID-19 vaccines in their respective communities. Manitoba Dr. Joel Antel says that the Manitoba Dental Association (MDA) had been in close contact with the provincial health authority since early in 2020 and the MDA asked how dentists could help fight the pandemic. “They told us two main things; don’t close your dental practices to help with vaccines because we don’t want to create any access to care issues, and that they would contact interested dentists to go through a training process, for those who volunteered to help out,” he says. The training included 5 hours of online lessons followed by an exam, and then a further 3 hours of in-person sessions. “Part of the hands-on training included giving saline solution injections to our fellow trainees, so it harkened back to our training in dental school,” says Dr. Antel. He was encouraged to see how many dentists in Manitoba put their names forward to volunteer as vaccinators—almost half of the dentists in the province. Dr. Joel Antel 30 | 2021 | Issue 3