Dentists lobby to keep kids’ care

Open up and say, “Uh-oh.”

The state’s budget problems – a $3 billion cash shortage over the next two years – has dentists worried that programs that pay for children from poor and uninsured families to have their teeth cleaned and fixed could be targeted for cuts.

So on Tuesday afternoon, five area dentists invited a group of state legislators to tour a children’s dental clinic. They talked business over dinner later at the Spokane Club.

The group focused on a program called ABCD, or Access to Baby and Child Dentistry, which ensures that dentists receive at least some money for treating uninsured children. The reimbursements come from Medicaid, which is funded with federal and state tax dollars.

It’s an attempt to change a troubling statistic: 44 percent of children 5 and younger in Washington have never visited a dentist.

“We simply have to do better, and ABCD helps accomplish this goal,” said Dr. Chris Herzog, a dentist at The Children’s Choice in Spokane.

The five dentists treat about 220 a children a day at two Spokane offices where children are treated regardless of whether they have insurance.

“We’re not turning anybody away,” Herzog said, adding that the dentists, who specialize in treating children, draw patients from a 200-mile radius.

Rotten teeth and dreadful oral hygiene have plagued Spokane and surrounding rural areas for years.

Adding fluoride to public drinking water supplies would help children build strong teeth and ward off tooth decay, say medical experts and government health officials. But they acknowledge that voters’ multiple rejections of such initiatives over the decades makes such an investment unlikely.

“We have this inkling that it will never happen,” Herzog said.

Taxpayers, insurers, and private businesses and medical providers are funding and participating in other programs, such as ABCD, that treat the oral health needs of Medicaid-eligible children.

Good oral hygiene is a component of good overall health. Eight years ago the U.S. surgeon general reported a link between oral bacteria and heart problems and other medical conditions.

The attention has led to better funding for dental programs that treat children.

“You can’t mix politics with kids’ health,” said Rep. Don Barlow, a Spokane Democrat.

Yet state budget-cutters will be looking for savings, and poor kids don’t generally have powerful lobbyists working on their behalf.

Herzog acknowledged that dentists and oral surgeons have been raked with bad publicity. He noted the civil trial and multimillion-dollar verdict against a Spokane oral surgeon who left a woman disfigured.

But dentists across Spokane are helping children, said Dr. Andrew Garabedian. That work is easier, he said, when they are reimbursed – at least partially – for treating the poor.

Garabedian noted that more dentists and pediatricians are checking teeth and gums during regular checkups because of ABCD funding. He said that’s the sort of short-term investment in preventive care that can offset major health expenses in the future.