Students in Fiji win oral health awards
Two students at the Fiji National University’s College of Medicine have received grant scholarships from Colgate Palmolive Fiji Limited to assist with investigation into oral healthcare. The travel grants are said to be worth around two thousand three hundred dollars.
One of the final-year students receiving the scholarships, Bevu Kaminieli, said his research would be concerned with the role of smoking cessation and the role of dental auxiliaries.
Public health doctor, and senior lecturer, Bernadette Pushpaangaeli stated that Colgate Palmolive had been aiding the countries Department of Oral Health as early as 2003; ‘The grant will enable the students to present their research outcomes at the Australia and New Zealand divisional meeting of the international Association of Dental Research. The idea behind this is to build and encourage people to research at a young age.’ Dr. Pushpaangaeli continued, ‘The best way to do this is when they are students. For anything to progress and develop in any profession to contribute to community’s needs and improve things for the community and people, we need people to keep looking into problems and finding solutions.’
The marketing manager of Colgate Palmolive, Suma Molia, said that the research done by the students aided their awareness programmes concerning oral health; ‘Their research work is something that Colgate is very interested in. We are involved in a lot of community oral health programmes. We would probably use those statistics and research work in our community outreach programmes to educate people.’
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