NORTH RIDGEVILLE – When one comes from a culture that highly values learning, having a career mindset to succeed and also the importance of giving back to the community, everyone wins. And in this particular instance, veterans from across the North Ridgeville area will be cracking a large smile because of the passion of a pair of local dentists and their staff.
On November 12, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., the husband and wife dynamic dentist duo of Ankur and Nisha Gupta will be providing their services at no charge to area veterans. The free dental work will include everything from routine cleanings to fillings and even extractions. The pair wanted to give back to the local veteran community out of a deep love of country, and a motivating underlying factor of having not served in the military.
The practice, North Ridgeville Family Dentistry, has been doing the Veteran’s Day services since 2005, and while this upcoming event is booked up, Gupta still encourages everyone, especially veterans, to take care of the dental health by regular brushing, flossing and routine checkups. They plan to see upwards of 120 patients in the single day, marathon dental session. Gupta said it will be the largest event they’ve ever done and translates to roughly $25,000 in dental services.
But having not served in the military caused Gupta to want to find another way to serve his country and honor its servicemen and women. He said that both he and his wife grew up in a culture that highly valued working hard in school, landing a good paying job and living the American Dream. He said that serving the country was never really discussed as he was growing up.
“My parents and my wife’s parents were both immigrants from India. We’re both first generation Americans,” he explained. “Our parents were wonderful, but they never really let us know when we were growing up that serving our country was an option. It was go to school, get good grades, get a job, which is fine. I followed a very straight-line trajectory from high school to college to dental school to opening my own practice.
My wife and I think that as we became adults with kids of our own, we just both had a little bit of a regret about the fact that when we were able to we didn’t really consider the option of serving and that regret stays and we’re still we’re still regretful about that,” Gupta explained.
Another reason the pair decided to do the Veteran’s Day promotion was in honor of one of their hygienists who had a family member serve in the Middle East, only to return with severe post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
“Our assumption was that health care was very easy to come by for veterans because they have the VA (Veteran’s Administration) and the VA has ample benefits,” Gupta said. “But what we found out is, the VA as wonderful as it is, has a pretty long waiting list right and that some veterans will have a toothache for months before they can get it taken care of.
“As entrepreneurs, we have our own office we can do whatever philanthropic stuff we want,” Gupta continued. “Just knowing that there were veterans that are suffering and the fact that my wife and I really have a strong desire to correct our decision of not serving when we were young made us stay OK well why don’t we just close the office around Veteran’s Day to our normal schedule and just see veterans all day and just do a bunch of free dental work.”
Ankur Gupta grew up in New Mexico, while wife Nisha was raised in Cambridge, Ohio. The pair met at dental school at the University of Michigan. When both secured a job locally at MetroHealth, the pair made Northeast Ohio their home. Ankur is also a Sunday School teacher with their local church, and also coaches youth basketball, while Nisha also works as a clinical instructor at Case Western Reserve University and has earned numerous accolades as a powerful public speaker.
The pair are deeply devoted to one another, their community and their practice. Ankur said it’s not just veterans that need help, and that he said he believes that everyone who can should find an outlet for their special gifts to share to make a community that much more vibrant.
“There’s lots of populations that could benefit from philanthropy and charitable work by people who are maybe a little bit more fortunate,” he said. “I feel like I kind of won the lottery by being American. My wife and I are both children of immigrants. We have a lot to be grateful for.
“I feel safe going for a walk. I feel like when I drink water it’s probably clean water, breathing clean air,” he continued. “There’s just so many little things about being here that just make me feel so lucky and I just feel like there’s a lot of people that are in this situation that don’t know how lucky they are.
“We’re lucky and we feel really grateful to be here,” he added. “How can we take whatever skills or talent or knowledge that we have and use that to just really make things better for somebody who might be just a little less lucky.”
Their office is at 34100 Center Ridge Road.