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1 <br /> ORANGE COUNTY <br /> BOARD OF COMMISSIONERS <br /> Action Agenda <br /> Item No. VMT <br /> ACTION AGENDA ITEM ABSTRACT <br /> Meeting Date: April 4, 1994 <br /> SUBJECT: Smart Start Funding for Short-term Dental Services Grant. <br /> DEPARTMENT: HEALTH PUBLIC HEARING: Yes X No <br /> ATTACHMENT(S) : INFORMATION CONTACT: <br /> HEALTH DIRECTOR'S OFFICE X2411 <br /> 1. NONE TELEPHONE NUMBER: <br /> Hillsborough - 732-8181 <br /> Chapel Hill - 968-4501 <br /> Mebane - 227-2031 <br /> Durham - 688-7331 <br /> PURPOSE: <br /> To accept a $29,575 grant award from the Orange County Partnership for <br /> Young Children (Smart Start) . The grant award will allow the Health <br /> Department in collaboration with the UNC-School of Dentistry, to provide <br /> dental screening, education, treatment planning, prophylaxis and referral <br /> for all children age 0-5 in day care centers, as well as, those children <br /> at home. The project will be carried out during May and June, 1994. <br /> BACKGROUND: <br /> The dental health needs of preschool children are not well documented. <br /> However, the Orange County Public Health . Dental Hygienist screened <br /> children at four day-care centers in both Southern and Northern Orange <br /> County. Of the one hundred and eleven children screened, twenty-three <br /> needed restorative or surgical treatment. Twenty percent of children <br /> screened for preschool registration needed dental treatment. Of the <br /> seventy-nine, Cedar Grove Head Start children screened, fifty needed <br /> treatment. Froatthese screening, it has been determined that there is a <br /> need to prompts- preventive dental health education and provide dental <br /> treatment to ,this population. <br /> The goal or vision of Smart Start is to ensure that children from birth <br /> to age five have the services needed for them to enter school healthy and <br /> ready to succeed. However, of the thirty-four local dentists surveyed, <br /> only four accept medicaid patients because of the extremely low rates. <br /> Other familes not eligible for medicaid or without private dental <br /> insurance, forgo dental treatment, resulting in their children suffering <br /> from dental decay, bleeding gums and impacted teeth which affect their <br /> school performance and self-esteem. <br />