| |
|
|
< Previous
| Home
| Next >
Section 1: Filling Gaps in HIV Dental Care
Ryan White Community Based Dental Partnerships
|
Since inception, varied strategies
have been crafted to enhance
HIV dental services, training of
staff, and management of dental
partnerships, as follows:
- Service delivery (e.g., reducing no-show rates through
special support and reinforcement methods, co-location of medical and dental
services)
- Patient education (e.g., one-on-one discussions during
appointments, smoking cessation support, patient education software for
in-clinic learning)
- Partnership operations that broaden service and training
networks (e.g., collaborative arrangements that work under structured rules such
as memoranda of agreement, referral networks that serve to ease
appointment-making and service linkages for clients, collaborative planning to
raise resources and target services)
- Consumer involvement (e.g., advisory boards, patient
satisfaction surveys, focus groups)
- Student/provider training (e.g., on-site rotations in
community clinics and one-on-one and small group discussions between patients
and dental students, targeting of dental residents and dental hygiene students).
|
Ryan White's Community Based Dental Partnership Program
The Dental Partnership is one of multiple HIV-focused oral health programs under the HRSA-administered Ryan
White HIV/AIDS Program, which funds community and State-level programs to deliver HIV primary care and support services such as
HIV medications and outpatient care. Ryan White has funded dental care since its inception in 1991, both as a primary care service
under all of its programs as well as under its HIV oral health initiatives. The Dental Partnership is a relatively new Ryan White
oral health initiative given that the first funds were awarded in 2002, over a decade after the Ryan White program’s beginning.
As such, the Partnership represents an evolution in the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program’s efforts to expand the Nation’s
capacity to deliver oral health care to PLWH.
The Dental Partnership is comprised of 12 Federal grantees located in 13 States and communities around the
Nation that deliver HIV dental care while simultaneously training dental professionals in these areas in order to expand community
capacity to deliver HIV oral health care. Since the program’s first full year of operations in 2004, the number of clients
getting HIV dental care has grown steadily: 4,328 patients received services in 2006—a 34 percent increase.
Likewise, the number of dental professionals (primarily, dental school students) trained in HIV oral health
care has grown. Nearly 2,500 dental students, dental residents, and dental hygienists received training from program from 2004
through 2006. The number of dental providers delivering direct clinical services to patients with HIV increased from 766 in 2004
to 943 in 2006. These results speak to the creativity and resourcefulness of Dental Partnerships in the context of funding levels
that have remained relatively flat over the program’s history. (See Section 2: Dental Partnership Activities
for more detailed data)
This report presents data on clients served and dental providers trained, along with insights on successful
strategies for providing high quality oral health care to HIV infected patients. Data and program activities are for calendar
years 2004, 2005, and 2006, during which Federal funds of $2.9 to $3.4 million annually were awarded to 12 Dental Partnership
grantees in 13 States. The average annual grant award was under $300,000. Dental Partnerships are largely comprised of
University-based dental schools working in partnership with an array of community agencies—collectively, around 50
major agencies across all sites. Examples of these community partners include AIDS service organizations, Section 330
Federally-funded Health Centers, community colleges, and regional AIDS Education and Training Centers funded by the Ryan
White HIV/AIDS Program.
Dental Partnerships use the following two-pronged strategy to deliver oral health care to PLWH while
building community capacity to deliver such care in the future:
- Oral health services are delivered in a community setting, where clients are easiest to reach and where
dental care can be integral to primary care and supports that help PLWH enter and remain in care. This community-based approach
is in notable contrast to institutional service settings like dental schools, which over the course of the AIDS epidemic have
taken on a considerable amount of the work in serving PLWH.
- Dental schools and community agencies have created training opportunities in order to expand the pool
of dental professionals who are trained and willing to care for PLWH in community settings.
|