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Shelly Gehshan Foundations’ Role In Improving Oral Health: Nothing To Smile About Health Affairs, January/February 2008; 27(1): 281-287. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF] [Reprints & Permissions]

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Improving Oral Health In Massachusetts

Kate W. Vaughan   ( 18 January 2008 )

Improving Oral Health In Massachusetts 18 January 2008
Kate W. Vaughan Health Care For All Send letter to journal: Re: Improving Oral Health In Massachusetts vaughan{at}hcfama.org Kate W. Vaughan	I applaud Ms. Gehshan for her thoughtful article on an often overlooked health issue -- oral health. As an oral health care advocate, I am happy to see someone bringing light to the nation’s most common, chronic disease of childhood: dental decay. What separates this health issue from so many others is that it is almost entirely preventable, and we have simple and proven ways to do so. When funders and communities make children’s oral health a priority, they can change the overall health and lives of children. In Massachusetts, we have a vibrant movement to improve our state’s oral health. Funded by Delta Dental of Massachusetts, the Health Foundation of Central Massachusetts, and Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, the statewide Oral Health Advocacy Taskforce was created in 2004 in response to the elimination of adult dental benefits for Medicaid recipients. Our public awareness campaign, Watch Your Mouth, is funded by the Oral Health Foundation and is now in its third year of raising awareness of the importance of children’s oral health. Together, these two campaigns have worked to make tremendous change in the oral health landscape of Massachusetts. Some of our many accomplishments include the reinstatement of dental benefits for over 600,000 adults who access care through Medicaid; the implementation of a Third Party Administrator for the Medicaid dental program; inclusion of dental benefits for members under 100% of the Federal Poverty Level of the state’s new health insurance product, Commonwealth Care; the creation of the first state legislative oral health caucus in the nation; and the creation of BEST Oral Health, a pre-school oral health pilot project. Thanks to the vision of foundations and corporations such as those listed above, we have started to make great change to the oral health care systems in Massachusetts.