Britney-Ann Sappleton overcomes odds, takes fear out of dental visits

In 2017, Britney-Ann Sappleton graduated from the Convent of Mercy Academy with nine Caribbean Secondary Education Certificate and eight Caribbean Advanced Proficiency subjects and went straight to the University of Technology (UTech) to study dentistry, a course lasting for five years.

Academic brilliance, however, does not necessarily equate to a smooth passage to earning a bachelor’s degree in a tough field, such as dentistry, coming from a single-parent home, among other drawbacks. And this is what Britney-Ann, now Dr Sappleton, realised during her studies at UTech, which was extended a further year because of the impact of COVID-19.

She graduated last year November with a Doctor of Medical Dentistry (DMD) with upper second-class honours.

The young doctor would be the first to tell you, though, that it wouldn’t have been possible without the support of her ever-present mother, Nadine Bernard.

As a young child, Sappleton was scared of going to the dentist, as most kids are. Strangely enough though, that was the main reason that actually made her enter the profession.

“I wanted to become a dentist because I, too, was very afraid of going to the dentist. So, I thought if I became the dentist then I wouldn’t have to go to the dentist, but then I realised when I started school that’s not how it works, I still got to go,” she said with a laugh as she related her story during a Gleaner interview last week.

“I had bad experiences going to the dentist as a child, I dreaded it. Whenever my mom told me that she made an appointment for me to go to the dentist, I would start crying immediately. So, it was because of my experiences and the fear of going to the dentist why I decided, when I was in sixth form and it was time to decide what you’re going to do when you go to university,” she added.

Even before she entered UTech dental school, the detractors were at work.

“Persons tried to influence me to choose another field of study because ‘your mother don’t make two-million a year, so how will you fund your tuition?’ is what they kept saying,” Sappleton said.

Student loan covered $1 million of the $2.1-million annual tuition leaving her to find the balance out of pocket. And even after the tuition was raised to $2.2 million after the third year, there was no turning back.

Finances apart, it was tough going from 2017 to 2023.

“It was very, very, very, very, very difficult,” the young dentist admitted. “It’s one of the hardest things I’ve done to date. Dental school is very stressful because, unlike medical school, we have to focus on the overall body, so, it’s very difficult.”

“And we had classes from like 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. sometimes. We don’t have scheduled classes on a Saturday, but we had to go in to the anatomy lab to prepare for exams. It was very difficult, the days were very long.”

Coming from a single-parent home presented its share of challenges.

“My first day at university was my brother’s first day at kindergarten and so my mom was juggling a baby and a first-year university student. We had to wake up early in the morning, drop my brother off at school – thankfully his school had, like a day-care before school started, and that opened at 5:30 a.m., so we drop him off at 5:30, she would take me to school for 8 o’clock and then go to work at 8:30. There were times when I had classes up until 9:30 p.m., reach home after 10, then we do it all over again in the morning. That was rough.”

She said it was a trying period for her, but a time during which she learned a lot.

“Those years taught me a lot about myself, taught me how tough I was, it showed me how resilient I was, it showed me that nothing was impossible. There were times when I cried. I’d be at school and I would call my mother, ‘Mommy, I am sorry, I cannot. I can’t go no further, this is too hard’. Thank God for me I have the most supportive mother there is. My mother never leaves me an inch.

“I can always call her, she would listen to me and wait until I’m finished crying then she would offer her opinion or suggestion. She was always there. Whenever I want to give up, she would say, ‘No, you can do it!’ If I never had this type of mother, I don’t know how I would have made it.”

But she’s in the field now, having started observing before beginning to practise in October 2022, with an associate who has two locations in Kingston and Spanish Town. She aims to begin her practice in another three to five years, saying she’s in no hurry.

Now that she’s in the field, was the struggle worth it?

“Absolutely! As I said before, it’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever done but if I was supposed to do it over I would definitely do it over. It’s very rewarding for me because though I don’t like going to the dentist, I actually like being a dentist because it puts you in a position where I understand the fear because I myself was fearful and I can now help other people to overcome the fear.

“And it’s a very good feeling when persons come to you and they sit in the chair and they say to you, ‘Doc. mi ‘fraid!’ and the first thing you can say is ‘I understand’. You walk them through it because you can relate to being on the other side of the chair. I like it, it’s rewarding for me, I wouldn’t change it!”

She said despite encountering a lot of “mind-blowing things on the job” she has absolutely no regrets.

Her opinion on oral health in Jamaica is not surprising as she thinks that not enough emphasis is being placed on it. A lot of people, she shared, don’t know the importance of oral health or its correlation with overall health.

Changing this requires a concerted effort, starting with young children at primary school age. She’s already doing her share, visiting the St Jago Prep School once or twice a year to speak to the children about oral health.

Then there’s a “myth” she wants to clear up.

“A lot of persons are of the mindset that dentistry is very expensive, or too expensive but I don’t think it is. I think the neglect of your oral health is what is expensive; I think the myth that dentistry is expensive needs to go,” Sappleton said.

When all is said and done, though, one of the lessons from this story has to be the relationship between Nadine Bernard and her daughter, Dr Britney-Ann Sappleton. In her own words, the dentist said her mother never leaves her an inch. Again, in her own words, this time directly to her mom, she says:

“I’ve told you so many times just how grateful I am to have a mom like her, how happy I am that I did well and that I made you proud. You didn’t put a lot of pressure on me but I took it upon myself to make you feel proud. I love you so much and I’m super grateful and I’ll continue to do my best to make you feel like all your efforts were not in vain and that I appreciate you.”

editorial@gleanerjm.com