Mobile dental service available to children
Area children who are underserved and without a dental home can be treated for several oral ailments at the Ronald McDonald Care Mobile dental health unit.
The dentist office on wheels is scheduled to remain parked outside of Florence Mattison Elementary School in Conway for the next two weeks.
A team of dental assistants, a dental hygienist, a patient information assistant, and one dentist operates the 40-foot, fully equipped dental clinic outside of elementary schools where summer programs are housed.Currently, the Florence Mattison grounds are the location of Pinnacle Pointe of Little Rock’s school-based behavioral health services summer program.
The mobile dental unit is not only serving students of the school and summer program but will take as many as meet qualifications.Dr. Cimone Heisel, D.D.S. aboard the unit, said the clinic is open to as many as can be served — usually 12 to 13 children per day.“We work with school principals and nurses to send out notice before we come to an area,” she said.
Qualifying children are those between ages 3 and 16 who do not have private insurance and who are not active patients of an established dental practice.
“We have anything that you could find in a dentist’s office. We do X-rays, cleanings, fillings, and we are equipped for Nitrous,” said Greg Martinez, dental assistant.
Two exam rooms are equipped with televisions mounted above young patients’ heads, and every cleaning also affords a patient a new, colorful pair of sunglasses.
Typical appointments begin with an initial cleaning, and as problems are observed, guardians provide consent forms on-site for dental procedures.
Common procedures performed by the team are sealants, restorations or fillings, pediatric crowns, extractions and other preventative or restorative dental care.
Every patient receives coaching on proper oral hygiene techniques.“We go to 50 schools between our three programs,” Martinez said. “Between the three Arkansas units, we provided more than $1 million in dental care to children last year.”
According to the Arkansas Department of Health’s oral health division, tooth decay in children has been associated with learning and sleeping difficulties, as well as problems maintaining proper nutrition.Heisel said that she believes there is a direct correlation between behavioral problems and oral health in children.
In Arkansas, 61 percent of children under age 9 have experienced tooth decay, according to the department of health.Twenty-four percent of public school children had untreated cavities, and 8 percent were in need of urgent dental care in 2009.Martinez said efforts like the one provided by Arkansas Children’s Hospital, Delta Dental and the Ronald McDonald House of Charities have raised Arkansas’ “children’s dental health grade.”
Arkansas was among 22 states raising their grades from 2010 on Pew’s Children’s Dental Campaign.The independent research group provides yearly grades to states based on data to assign an A, B, C, D, or F based on overall oral health in children.
Arkansas jumped from an F to a C grade in one year.
According to a Pew release, Arkansas policy makers like state Senator David Johnson can be credited as one who led the state’s grade improvement.
Pew gave two areas of progress that could account for a spike in overall oral health among children.
“First, Arkansas increased the share of its Medicaid-enrolled children who received actual dental care. In fact, 57 percent of these kids obtained a dental service of some kind, making Arkansas one of the top-ranking states,” the release states.
The second area of progress was in the legal removal of a “hurdle” for dental hygienists to place sealants on children’s teeth.
Sealants are applied to the most cavity-prone teeth and prevent decay before it begins.
The Ronald McDonald Care Mobile is open weekdays at this location except for Fridays, from 8 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. until June 30.
Applications for oral checkups, cleanings and procedures are available at Florence Mattison Elementary off of East German Lane and inside the mobile unit.
The service is offered at no charge to the patient or family, though Medicaid is billed for services if the child is insured by Medicaid.
(Staff writer Courtney Spradlin can be reached by e-mail at courtney.spradlin@thecabin.net or by phone at 505-1236. To comment on this and other stories in the Log Cabin, log on to www.thecabin.net. Send us your news at www.thecabin.net/submit)
