Dental care at schools helps kids – and all of us

With the sagging economy crushing public health budgets, it’s heartening to see someone like Gail Heacox step up with her school-based dental care program. The veteran hygienist travels to elementary and middle schools to take care of children who might otherwise go without. She is the first in Spokane County to offer a school-based sealant program, which goes a long way toward preventing cavities.

Single parents who struggle to get their children to appointments thank her. Parents without dental coverage thank her. But we ought to all thank her, because the lack of care impacts society in a variety of ways.

A child with decaying teeth is going to miss school, fall behind in studies and be at-risk for eventually dropping out of school. Dropouts are less productive and increase all kinds of societal costs, particularly in the criminal justice realm. Poor dental health is also a barrier to closing the achievement gap in schools because dental disease is largely concentrated among children from lower-income families.

It was this connection that captured the interest of Communities In Schools, a nationwide partnership designed to keep kids in school by making sure parents are aware of a community’s social services.

The Pew Center on the States recently released a report calling dental services the largest unmet need for children, with tooth decay being the most common childhood disease.

As the unemployment rolls have grown, so has the number of families who have lost health care coverage. Lagging tax revenues have also blown a hole in government health budgets, meaning more families have lost state aid.

Beyond the mobile service offered by Heacox, there are programs that parents might not know about.

The Spokane Regional Health District’s Web site lists ABCD – Access to Baby and Child Dentistry, which matches Medicaid-eligible children to dentists. The Web site also has an extensive dental referral list.

Families in need should tap these resources, because there are many more dental professionals like Heacox who are willing to fill the gaps in dental care.