Navy People: A Dentist and a divisional officer
22 August 2011
Edensor Park girl Karina Cvejic joined the Royal Australian Navy after a family friend suggested she look into the possibilities offered by the Navy as a Dental Officer.
Karina, 26, joined the Navy as an Undergraduate, receiving financial assistance from the Navy to complete the last two years of her Dental degree.
After completing her New Entry Officer’s Course at HMAS Creswell, Karina was posted to the Navy’s main Sydney base HMAS Kuttabul.
She works as both a Dentist and a divisional officer. She is responsible for seven dental sailors and spends up to eight hours a day in the clinic seeing patients.
She has just completed her first trip away with the Navy using her dental skills in the Pacific Islands as a member of the Pacific Partnership 2011 team.
Pacific Partnership is an annual Humanitarian Civic Assistance (HCA) program that aims to strengthen alliances and promote multilateral security cooperation.
Now in its seventh year, partner nations continue their mission to improve the lives of people in the Pacific region, as well as improve the capacities of nations and organisations to respond to disasters through recurring opportunities for cooperation and training.
Karina has been working in remote villages in the countries of East Timor and the Federated States of Micronesia, giving medical aid to people who don't often have easy access to proper medical care.
"This was my first deployment to sea and to get here I had to complete a certain competency level. Normally it takes 18 months to complete, I managed to finish mine in 12 months just so I could go on this deployment”, Karina said.
"I’m having the best time of my life. Flying to the remote site of Ainaro was an amazing experience, and doing dentistry in a camping chair is not something I’d normally have the chance to do. It was heartwarming and very humbling being able to help the local communities."
A keen skier for the past 20 years, Karina will be joing the Navy ski team on her return to Australia and travelling to Perisher to take part in the Inter-Service ski competitions.
