In Maine, about half of all children are not receiving preventive dental care, and even fewer can access care in a traditional dental home. Not only does dental disease contribute to local issues, including pain and difficulty eating, but systemic health effects that correlate to dental disease are also a concern.
It is good practice to approach dental disease prevention similarly to how other diseases are prevented: the primary care setting. Medical dental integration (MDI) is the practice of integrating oral health and primary care to address oral health as part of overall health. MDI allows families to access preventive and early intervention services before the dental disease process begins.
MDI allows families to access preventive and early intervention services when it matters most, BEFORE the dental disease process begins.
Learn more about a virtual dental home (VDH), one part of MDI, in this podcast with Courtney Vannah, MCD's senior program manager of Oral Health Initiatives:
Accomplishing MDI
MCD provides leadership for several medical dental integration (MDI) initiatives of the Children’s Oral Health Network of Maine (COHN)’s Health Integration Action Team (HIAT). In collaboration with COHN partners, MCD has developed an initiative called Dental Steps that offers different options for primary care practices to integrate preventive oral health care into well-child visits of children ages 0–5.
Dental Steps supports families in giving their children a life free from dental disease by using a multipronged approach that includes assessment, prevention, and education in well-child visits, onsite prevention, early intervention dental services, and virtual connection to a dental home.
