Failure of dental hygienist bill shows harm for Georgia children
Primary care doctors are always on the forefront of medical care for children, but when it comes to dental health, hundreds of thousands of Georgia children don’t have access.
A researcher at Georgia Tech recently reported that Georgia is dropping the ball on dental health. More than 500,000 children in the state don’t have adequate insurance to allow them to routinely see dentists. The children often fall under Medicaid and PeachCare loopholes and their parents don’t otherwise have insurance.
The report released by Georgia Tech also said that over 600,000 children have to travel more than 30 miles in an urban area or more than 45 miles in a rural area to reach a dentist.
Worse, a bill before the legislature during the last session failed because legislators did not want to allow dental hygienists to perform an increased number duties originally performed by dentists – a measure that would save providers and patients considerable cash.
GeorgiaHealthNews reports:
The bill would have allowed hygienists to clean teeth in safety-net clinics, nursing homes, federally qualified health centers and school-based health clinics without a dentist present — if the work had been authorized by a dentist. Currently, Georgia law requires that a dentist actually be present in the facility for a hygienist to do such work.
Hygenists are already allowed to clean teeth without having a dentist present.
The report was presented to a General Assembly Health and Human Services Committee for the House. The version of the bill that died during the 2016 session did have the support of the Georgia Dental Association, a dentist lobbying group.
Chairman of the House Health and Human Services Committee Sharon Cooper says that dentists often refuse to accept Medicaid because they aren’t reimbursed enough, and the solution to to provide additional funds.
Georgia is 49th in the nation for dental access with just 4.4 dentists per 100,000 residents.
The hygienist bill is expected to be proposed again in 2017.
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Jessica Szilagyi
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Thanks for a great article. I would like to provide some clarity around a couple of points that are inaccurate. The dental hygiene bill (HB 684) would have authorized dental hygienist to provide the exact same services they are currently licensed to provide under the rules regulated by the Georgia Board of Dentistry.
Dental hygienists would have still been under the supervision of a dentist, only the dentist would not have to have been in the treatment facility and ALL services provided would have to have been authorized by a supervising dentist.
The bill failed last session because the state dental association misrepresented the facts to our legislators and asked them to kill the bill. It was not legislators who hurt Georgia’s underserved children, it was the state dental association.
Thanks for this great article. There also needs to be more clarity around the issue. For the last 30 years public health hygienists have been able to see patients without a dentist present in Georgia. The bill last year was extremely conservative. The Federal trade commission even commented on this last year and felt as if Georgia should pursue general supervision which would of fixed so many of these issues. But in a compromise with the dental association to have them support the bill it was kept to only safety net settings. Which is just the tip of this issue. The dental association then misrepresented the compromised bill and lobbied against the bill behind close doors, and even after testifing in a hearing that they were in “100%” agreement they sent out a faxed call to action against the bill. Not only would changing the supervision of dental hygienist in this state help its citizens health, it would also create needed jobs in our state for dental hygienists. Currently, we have 16 dental hygiene schools in this state but have a shortage of dentists and only 1 dental school. 45 other states allow general supervision, which would allow dental hygienists the ability to see patients without a dentist present and the dentist would authorize procedures beforehand. There continues to be misrepresentation and lies about safety concerns with dental hygienists seeing patients without a dentist present yet 45 states already have this level of supervision and so has Georgia in public health settings. Georgia is so behind the times in not utilizing this level of supervision in all settings! It’s time to catch up Georgia, provide jobs, save money and take care of our citizens.
Legislators write a bill they don’t know what is in it.?
Dentists circle the wagons,
Legislators know gold teeth are in them thar wagons.
Pass the nitrous oxide.
Legislators will have a chance to do the right thing for Georgia’s underserved children during the 2017 session. Let us hope they will care more about their constituents this session than the state dental association helping to fund their re-election campaigns.