A joint effort between public and private entities is working to bring new dentists to rural Iowa communities by helping to pay off student loans, the Des Moines Register reported.
Delta Dental's Iowa loan repayment program has offered awards for two dentists to practice in areas where a lack of access to care exists, the Register reported.
The state's largest insurance provider has offered a $50,000 repayment grant awarded over a three-year period to cover student loans of rural dentists since 2002, according to the article. This year, two grants will be made.
Additionally, the Iowa Legislature has appropriated funds for two matching grants. Communities that seek dental services have pitched in, the Register noted. Two of them will match the state's $25,000 loan repayment plan.
A stipulation of the award is that the practitioner must accept Medicaid and patients from underserved communities, such as the disabled, elderly, nursing home residents, refugees, and the homeless, the article stated.
One community supplemented a Delta Dental award recipient with a $150,000 low-interest loan to help a new dentist open her practice after the town's only dentist retired, the Register reported.
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