Team members in the Lucy Corr Foundation Dental Clinic were all smiles earlier this month when they accepted a jumbo-sized, $11,057 check from Central Virginia Dental Care, PLC. The funds will convert directly into exams, fillings and dentures for seniors who might not otherwise afford them.

The gift represents proceeds from the organization’s annual charity golf tournament, held in June at Independence Golf Club. The tournament supports free and charitable clinics across the Richmond region.

Prior to this year’s tournament, Michael Hanley, DDS, the clinic’s dental medical director, requested that Central Virginia Dental Care include Lucy Corr among the beneficiaries. “We jumped on board and said, absolutely,” said Laurie Henderson, administrative assistant at Central Virginia Dental Care.

Richard Bates, DDS, a volunteer dentist, accepted the check on behalf of the clinic team. “It was way more than what I expected,” Dr. Bates said, “but I know that it’ll be put to good use here at the clinic.”

Lucy Corr sits at the geographic center of Central Virginia Dental Care’s offices, and several of the practice’s dentists already volunteer at the clinic. Handing over the check, Henderson said, was the best part of a job she finds genuinely empowering.

Since 2008, the Lucy Corr Foundation Dental Clinic has provided free and low-cost dental care to uninsured and underinsured seniors. These include Lucy Corr residents and older adults from across the surrounding region. The clinic delivered more than $3.5 million in free care since it opened. It is a member of the Virginia Association of Free and Charitable Clinics, a network of more than 70 clinics statewide, and a clinical training site for dental and dental hygiene students from the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Dentistry, who frequently deliver care to patients.

In a typical year, the clinic treats roughly 350 to 360 individual patients and last year provided $260,000 in free services, said Kristen Bruce, the clinic’s coordinator. The donation goes straight back into that work, she said, paying for the materials behind restorations, denture fabrication and denture repairs.

“Our patients come in and say, ‘You’ve given me my confidence back,'” Bruce said. “They’re able to eat again, and see their children, and smile at their grandchildren.”

Bates, who retired from private practice about a year ago and has volunteered at Lucy Corr for roughly four years, mentors senior dental students on Fridays, when the clinic typically sees six to eight patients. Residents can come down from their rooms without arranging transportation, which for many is the difference between getting care and going without. Patients who would be turned away elsewhere find a team here that has learned how to work with them, whether that means a longer appointment, a quieter room or a different position in the chair.

“A lot of patients need services that aren’t provided elsewhere,” Bates said, “and Lucy Corr provides that for them.” Asked what he would tell a colleague weighing how to spend retirement, Bates did not hesitate: “It’s such an opportunity to give back. The feeling you get from the patients that you see and the work that’s being done, it overwhelms me sometimes.”

The clinic is the Lucy Corr Foundation’s largest and longest-running initiative, and its costs — from staff to equipment to supplies — make up the largest share of the Foundation’s annual budget. Gifts like this one keep the chairs full and the doors open.

“One of the toughest things to get on a campus like this is dental care; we have it on site,” said Lucy Corr CEO Michael Cunningham. “Being able to reach out to the community and give dental services to those who can’t afford it is a great privilege and a responsibility.”

Click here to learn more about the Lucy Corr Foundation Dental Clinic and make a gift to support its work.