1. Comprehensive Prevention School-Based Oral Health Program
Suzanne Martin, MSW
Hugh Tilson, JD, MPH
Thank you for having us here today. We appreciate the opportunity to speak with you and tell you more about the North Carolina Oral Health Collaborative and our current advocacy goal of piloting a comprehensive, prevention school-based oral health program starting in high-risk elementary schools. My name is Suzanne Martin and I am the Interim Director for the NC Oral Health Collaborative and here with me is Hugh Tilson, President of Tilson Solutions who is our political strategist.

2. Purpose
North Carolina Oral Health Collaborative convenes diverse stakeholders to identify and resolve consumer-level and systemic barriers to good oral health and to accelerate implementation of policies and practices that reduce oral health disparities and promote improved oral health for all North Carolinians.
Our purpose is to convene diverse stakeholders to identify and resolve consumer-level and systemic barriers to good oral health and to accelerate implementation of policies and practices that reduce oral health disparities and promote improved oral health for all North Carolinians.

3. Achieve oral health for all North Carolinians.
Mission
Achieve oral health for all North Carolinians.
Our mission is even simpler – to achieve oral health for all North Carolinians.

4. Membership Representation & Organizational Structure
Extended Stakeholder Group
Full Collaborative (150+ members)
Workgroups & Capacity Building Grantees
CAT = Collaborative Acceleration Team & Staff
Statewide
Grass Blade Levels
Social
Public
Private
Our members represent diverse stakeholder groups across NC, which include:
Grass-top, intermediary, and grassroots organizations
Social interties, such as nonprofits and faith-based agencies
Public universities, colleges, federal, state and county agencies, schools and elected officials
Private foundations, dentists, doctors, child care providers and other businesses
The visual on the right provides an overview of the NCOHC’s structure. We are very proud that our membership has grown to over 150 members who comprise a portion of the overall extended stakeholder group, which includes all North Carolinians. One thing I will note is while the Collaborative had strong representation from “content experts”, that is folks working directly on issues related to oral health, what was missing was the voices of “context experts”. For this reason, we launched our Capacity Building Mini-Grants program that enables us to partner with 7 community-based and intermediary organizations that already had some inclination towards health equity and/or social justice, to begin incorporating oral health into their repertoire. The inner-most layer is where our staff and advisory group, the Collaborative Acceleration Team (CAT), are situated. This illustration is a reminder to those of us at the center that our work impacts more than ourselves and it is our duty to use our power to ensure others have access to good oral health care.

5. Current Advocacy Goal
Improved Access to Comprehensive Preventive Oral Health Services for Children through School-based Programs

6. Regulatory Barriers
Need a sustainable approach to a service for which there is not a traditional market but for which effectiveness is known
Avoid Scope of Practice at the General Assembly by focusing on Rules
Regulatory barriers to sustainability
Two hygienist limit
On-site requirement / direct supervision
120 days prior examination requirement
Dental assistant role not clear

7. Current Statutory Framework
Implement a tailored approach to utilize dental hygienists and dental assistants to provide comprehensive school-based preventive oral health services, including sealants, under the direction of public health dentists
90-233(a) allows public health dentists to ‘direct’ public health hygienists for state government programs and through local health departments
90-233(b) establishes limit of 2 hygienists for private practice dentists
120 day prior examination by a dentist is required by rule but not in the General Statutes
No changes to the General Statutes are needed to address these issues

8. Public / Private Partnership
90-233(a) requires that directing dentists be ‘employed’ by a State government program or by local health departments. Will need to understand:
What local health departments are already doing and barriers
What could qualify as a ‘State program’ and what is needed
How best to partner / collaborate with FQHCs
Possible employment options to facilitate community dentist participation where desired

9. Next Steps
We request your support for this approach, or something like it that accomplishes the same goals, and your partnership in developing and implementing it and future work

10. Get Involved with NC Oral Health Collaborative
Become a Member – FREE!
Join Our Newsletter Listserv
Text NCOHC to 22828 Us
Visit Our Website
Now comes the best part of my presentation when I warmly welcome you to get involved in the NC Oral Health Collaborative! There are several ways to engage our network.
BECOME A MEMBER – it’s FREE! If you support the mission, values, and guiding principles, please sign our statement of support at this website.
If you would like to learn more please join our mailing list by texting “NCOHC” (all caps) to the phone number “22828”. This send a text response asking for your , which will be added to our list. Don’t worry, we keep your information private and do not clutter up your inboxes!
If you want to send us your questions or requests for more information on the Collaborative please us at
Finally, you can visit our website for more about us, our members, and resources at oralheatlhnc.org.