Dental therapy advocates have a new tool at their disposal: The Model Dental Therapy Rule and Best Practices Guide. The document will serve as a guide to developing model rules for dental therapy implementation following passage of a dental therapy licensing law by a state legislature. Implementation rules can expedite or hinder the utilization of dental therapists in a state depending on how successful advocates are in the rulemaking process. This document will assist dental therapy advocates, policymakers, dental boards, and other stakeholders nationwide.

The Model Rule document provides options for Tribes to implement dental therapy once a state licensing law has passed. For example, Tribes can establish a certification board under the Community Health Aide Program, adopt Tribal requirements, or use the state licensing structure to employ dental therapists.

The National Indian Health Board joined the National Model Dental Therapy Rule Panel to collaborate with dental therapy experts from across the country to create the document.

The Society of American Indian Dentists (SAID) is offering a scholarship to cover the costs of the Dental Admission Test (DAT) for pre-dental students who are members of SAID. DAT is a standardized test required for admission to most dental schools in the US. The scholarship aims to prepare American Indian & Alaskan Native (AI/AN) students to enter the practice of dentistry with academic coaching, admission test preparation and mentoring to enable AI/AN pre-dental students to gain admission to a U.S. dental college and see success in their first year. This scholarship is available to AI/AN undergraduate students who are members of SAID and are planning to take the DAT before December 31, 2022.

The application deadline is February 28, 2022. More information is available here.

Legislation that would provide for dental services at the Veterans Administration (VA) has been introduced in the House and Senate. The Veterans Dental Care Eligibility Expansion and Enhancement Act of 2021 (S. 3017) and the Dental Care for Veterans Act (H.R. 914) are each awaiting committee hearings.

Nearly nine million veterans are enrolled in the VA healthcare system, but in 2020, only 463,000 veterans received dental services from the VA due to statutory requirements limiting the number of eligible veterans that can receive dental care (see page 96).

Of the nine million VA enrollees, only 1.4 million are eligible for comprehensive dental care under the current requirements, excluding 8 in 10 veterans from the benefit. The legislation would remove those limitations and allow all VA enrollees to receive dental care through the VA healthcare system. Additionally, the Senate legislation creates a student loan repayment program for dentists, oral surgeons, and dental hygienists working at high need VA sites.

The House Committee on Veterans Affairs held a hearing on a similar bill in July 2020, during the 116^th Congress.

In December 2021, the National Institute of Dental and Craniofacial Research, an agency within the National Institutes of Health housed in the US Department of Health & Human Services, released a 20-year follow up report to the 2000 US Surgeon General's report on national oral health.

The 2021 follow up, "Oral Health in America: Advances and Challenges," details the past 20 years worth of changes in the oral health system that have improved oral health outcomes for Americans, as well as the ongoing barriers to equitable oral health across populations.

The report found that American Indians and Alaska Natives have the highest oral disease burden of any ethnic group.

Lawmakers have reintroduced legislation in Washington State that would expand dental therapy statewide. H.B. 1885 would establish a state licensing process for dental therapists to practice in underserved settings throughout the state.

Washington passed its Tribal dental therapy law in 2017, and lawmakers have considered expanding dental therapy statewide in every year since. H.B. 1885 follows the December 2021 release of the legislature's Dental Therapy Taskforce final report that recommended statewide adoption of dental therapy.

A new webinar from the National Partnership for Dental Therapy highlights another aspect of dental therapy: the model’s free market oriented approach to expanding access to care. By improving consumer choice, dental therapy makes the oral health care market more competitive for the consumer and makes providers more efficient. The webinar was co-hosted by the Wisconsin Oral Health Coalition and featured leading state and national voices on how dental therapy gives greater health care choice and access to patients.

Watch a recording of the webinar here and view the slides here.