Report looks at limited access to dental health, offers recommendations
A report this week from the Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council looks at the consequences of inadequate access to oral health care and recommends ways to improve access.
Dentist chair at DeWitt Clinton High School in the Bronx, where Debra Sperling, D.M.D., does cleanings, fillings, preventive care and applies fluoride sealants to prevent future damage.
The report is set for release on Wednesday but embargoed copies are available to reporters today, beginning at 11 a.m. EDT. The committee that wrote the report will discuss it at a briefing at 1 p.m. Wednesday at the National Press Club, which will be webcast (available at national-academies.org. Reporters can obtain copies of the report or register to attend the briefing by contacting the National Academies’ Office of News and Public Information at 202-334-2138 or news@nas.edu.
Just as with other aspects of health care, children, older adults, and people who live in rural areas are affected by economic, structural, geographic and cultural factors that limit access to dental health care.
Several entries in the Awards for Excellence in Health Care Journalism have examined oral health care:
- 2010 entry: Out of reach: The rural health care gap, David Wahlberg, Wisconsin State Journal
- 2010 entry: State Lags in Dental Health Care for Children, Laurie A Udesky writing for The New York Times
- 2010 entry: Does the state have teeth to discipline dentists? by James T. Mulder, The (Syracuse, N.Y.) Post-Standard
- 2009 third-place entry: Kelley Weiss, of Capital Public Radio, looked at debt racked up on dental credit cards
- 2007 first-place winner: State of Decay: West Virginia’s Oral Health Crisis, by Eric Eyre, The Charleston (W.V.) Gazette [Tip sheet]
- 2008 entry: Carol Smith examined a dental death in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
- 2005 first-place winner: “The Trouble with Teeth,” Emily Hanford and Deborah George, North Carolina Public Radio [Listen to MP3]
Watch for more resources on oral health on the AHCJ website.
Workshop explored health needs of rural residents
Filed under: Health journalism, Health policy, Public health, Studies
Dennis Berens, president of the National Rural Health Association, called media coverage of health reform a failure – but not the only failure in framing the issue for the public.
Kansas psychiatrist Roy Menninger said barriers to mental health services in rural have changed little over the past three decades, with serious consequences.
And while a growing population of seniors are drawing on health resources, soaring childhood obesity rates are another drain in the often impoverished areas, experts on aging and childhood said.
Those were some of the highlights of Rural Health Journalism Workshop 2010 in Kansas City, Mo., on June 4. More than 50 people attended the event, part of the Association of Health Care Journalists’ Midwest Health Journalism Program.
With 15 speakers and other topics including health disparities and oral health, attendees of the free, daylong event left with story ideas and new resources to enhance their reporting.
Read more about the workshop …
Dental health care disparities overlooked
Filed under: Hot Health Headline, Pharmaceuticals
Guy Boulton of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel investigates the “lack of access to dental care for children and adults on limited incomes,” calling it “one of the most entrenched, widespread and overlooked problems of the U.S. health care system.”
Eric Eyre, who did award-winning coverage of West Virginia’s dental health problem, shares his insights and reporting methods, as well as starting points and key sources. Eyre’s article includes a link to a questionnaire about how the story was reported, a dentist’s presentation on the “Status of Oral and Visual Health in Rural America” from AHCJ’s 2008 Rural Health Journalism Workshop and an MP3 of the discussion at that workshop.
In Wisconsin, Boulton reports, the state Medicaid program for low-income families pays less than private insurers and is thus accepted by few dentists around the state. Boulton takes an in-depth look at the deficiencies of the state program and of HMOs and finds that the state’s not yet doing enough to address the problem.
Among the things Bouton discovered: “The results can be seen in young adults: 42% of all new military recruits cannot be deployed until they receive dental care.”
-
Join us in Atlanta
for Health Journalism 2012
Fellowship applications
due Feb. 27
New at HealthJournalism.org
- Data gives depth to investigation of patient safety
- What reporters should know about Alzheimer’s and related dementias
- Apply for fellowships to attend Health Journalism 2012
- AHCJ asks Supreme Court to permit broadcast of arguments in health reform case
- Tips for print, online journalists to embrace broadcast opportunities
- Numbers reveal how often, or how rarely, states check doctors’ disciplinary records
- How I did it: Falsified charts in nursing homes linked to patient care
- Access Denied: Looking at a lack of health care availability
- Transparency & medical errors: Public reporting of patient harm is a potent force
