The Universal Health Care Action Network of Ohio (UHCAN Ohio) is talking with state lawmakers about sponsoring a bill that would allow dental therapists to practice in the state, according to a story in the Columbus Dispatch.
About 1.5 million people in Ohio do not have medical insurance, and UHCAN Ohio estimates that three times that number don't have dental coverage, the story noted. Ohio has 59 federally designated dental shortage areas.
To help address the access-to-care challenges many of these regions and individuals face, UHCAN Ohio is proposing a two-year dental therapist program that would be taught at dental and dental hygiene schools. Graduates would work under the direction of a dentist, but the supervision would not have to be onsite.
The Ohio Dental Association (ODA) opposes the idea, according to the Dispatch.
''It's probably not money well spent,'' Paul Casamassimo, DDS, chief of dentistry at Nationwide Children's Hospital and a member of the ODA's executive committee, told the Dispatch.
Other options include sending more mobile dental units and dental students to shortage areas and training primary care providers to provide basic dental services to children, such as applying fluoride varnishes and teaching parents how to brush their children's teeth, Dr. Casamassimo said.
