The Midwest Network for Oral Health Integration (MNOHI) and NNOHA partnered to develop this promising practice that shares how Crescent Care Community Health Center implemented community health workers to coordinate care for medical and dental integration.

The Midwest Network for Oral Health Integration (MNOHI) partnered with NNOHA to develop this publication which outlines best practices from community health centers that have implemented innovative care coordination strategies for medical and dental integration.

This publication builds on the 2014 User's Guide for integrating oral health and primary care practice. The guide includes implementation strategies, examples, and health center promising practices for medical and dental integration.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

NNOHA is working to measure the impact on oral health services when the medical team receives training in oral health core competencies.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

CommUnityCare in Texas shares how their organization implemented medical and dental integration through NNOHA Integration of Diabetes and Oral Health Learning Collaborative to help improve the health outcomes of patients with diabetes.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

This promising practice features Horizon Health Care, Inc. in South Dakota. This health center implemented a medical and dental integration program for patients with diabetes while participating in NNOHA's Integration of Diabetes and Oral Health Learning Collaborative.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

Live Webinar: 7/27/21

Integrating oral health, primary care, and behavioral health is a strategy to increase access to care and improve overall health outcomes. This webinar will feature Jordan Valley Community Health Center. They’ll share strategies to integrate medical and dental care. In addition, they’ll share how they’ve integrated behavioral health into other departments. The webinar will discuss the value of medical and dental integration and strategies to engage the whole health care team. 

Objectives:

1. Describe strategies to integrate oral health and primary care practice.

2. Discuss the value of medical and dental integration.

3. Learn how one health center successfully integrated oral health, primary care, and behavioral health.

Live webinar on 12/12/2019

Live webinar on 11/27/18  

National Network for Oral Health Access and National Health Care for the Homeless Council have partnered to present this webinar on oral health and diabetes for patients experiencing homelessness. There is an association between periodontal disease and diabetes. There is a heavy burden of periodontal disease and diabetes for individuals experiencing homelessness due to the barriers they experience to healthcare. This webinar will review the relationship between periodontal disease and diabetes, barriers to healthcare, and prevalence of diabetes and periodontal disease in this population. This webinar will also feature health center experiences with treating patients who experience homelessness.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

Live webinar on 8/1/18  

NNOHA is a HRSA training and technical assistance provider for integration of high quality oral health services and primary care practice to increase the percentage of health center patients who receive oral health care. Being that there is a relationship between oral health and general health, NNOHA partnered with the Georgia and Pennsylvania Primary Care Associations to offer a Learning Collaborative on integration of oral health and primary care practice (IOHPCP). This webinar will discuss the lessons learned and experiences from two health centers: Albany Area Primary Health Care (GA) and Family Practice and Counseling Network (PA) in their work to integrate medical and dental.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

In February 2014, HRSA announced the Interprofessional Oral Health in Primary Care Practice (IPOHPCP) initiative. The goal of this initiative is to increase access to oral health care in Health Centers and safety net settings by increasing the oral health clinical competencies of Health Center primary care providers and incorporating oral health into primary care practice.

The first element of this initiative was the development of Interprofessional Oral Health Core Clinical Competencies (IPOHCCC) for primary care providers. NNOHA served as the coordinator and technical assistance provider for an 18-month pilot implementation of IPOHCCC in three Health Centers, resulting in the ability of primary care providers to deliver oral health services including risk assessment, oral evaluation, preventive procedures, education and referral for dental care, to their patients during the primary care visit.

The experiences and findings from the three IPOHCCC pilot project teams resulted in NNOHA’s recent publication, A User’s Guide for Implementation of Interprofessional Oral Health Core Clinical Competencies: Results of a Pilot Project. This presentation provides an overview of the user guide including sections on assessing readiness, planning, developing training systems, updating health information systems, modifying clinical care systems, developing evaluation systems and addressing challenges.

This user’s guide provides a structure, options, and suggestions to help Health Centers develop programs to implement oral health competencies, thereby integrating oral health into primary care practice, increasing access to oral health care, and improving the oral health status of the populations Health Centers serve. This webinar was presented by Dr. Irene Hilton on 2/23/15.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

The Patient-Centered Health Home is a concept being implemented through a variety of approaches including full integration, co-location, shared financing, virtual linkages and facilitated referral and follow-up. Health Homes are an important approach for helping to ensure that health center populations have access to comprehensive health care services, including dental care. This presentation describes how oral health can be integrated into primary care systems to improve health care quality and outcomes of the patients we serve, by illustrating promising practices from a health center oral health program. 

Co-hosted by NNOHA and the Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU), this webinar shares the implications of low health literacy and discuss ways providers and health care facilities can address office practices to improve patients’ understanding of oral health issues.

AAP has a list of resources and training tools for medical providers to engage in oral health. 

This promising practice describes an initiative designed to increase the number of oral HIV testing conducted during a dental examination.

This promising practice describes how Choptank Community Health System established dental treatment guidelines for adult patients with uncontrolled hypertension who were attending acute care.

Integration of oral health and primary care practice is a strategy to increase access and improve health outcomes. There is an emergence of a new and alternative model, embedding a dental provider in the medical clinic. This document summarizes the results of the 2019 NNOHA Integrated Models survey and the subsequent focus group findings.

This promising practice describes how El Rio Community Health Center instituted an integrated, preventive approach to caries prevention utilizing the pediatric medical and dental professional staff, while simultaneously increasing access to care.

NNOHA has identified common characteristics of Health Centers that successfully integrate oral health care and primary care practice. It is important that CHCs conduct thorough planning and identify their readiness for an integration project. This document serves to assist CHCs in identifying their readiness for integrating oral health and primary care practice.

The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) Integration of Oral Health and Primary Care Practice initiative strives to improve access to early detection and preventive interventions by expanding oral health clinical competency of primary care clinicians, leading to improved oral health. This report describes three components of the initiative and makes the recommendations for designing a competency-based, interprofessional practice model to integrate oral health and primary care. (February 2014)

On July 7, 2014, NNOHA conducted a learning community call on medical-dental integration. This forum allowed Health Center members (and Primary Care Association members) of the Strengthening the Oral Health Initiative (SOHSN) to connect with other programs in the initiative in order to discuss their challenges and promising practices around the topic.

In 2005, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) supported a pilot study for an Oral Health Disparities Collaborative. The pilot ran from 2005-2006 within four Community Health Centers, with the aim of developing comprehensive oral health care system change, based upon the Planned Care model and evidence-based concepts to generate improvements in measures for Early Childhood Caries prevention and treatment and Perinatal oral health.

This 2012 white paper, prepared to support the work of the Funders Oral Health Policy Group by Qualis Health, presents case studies of four Community Health Centers that have taken steps to have medical and dental delivery systems work more closely together and to incorporate oral health in their quality improvement processes. Drawing on insights from these case studies as well as national literature on this subject, this paper identifies key lessons learned.

NNOHA and the National Health Care for the Homeless Council developed this publication to bring awareness to the intersection of oral health and behavioral health concerns or cognitive impairment in people experiencing homelessness. The publication will share the impacts of behavioral health illness on oral health and how behavioral health and dental providers can work together to address this intersection in their practices.

This resource was supported by NNOHA's HRSA National Training and Technical Assistance Partnership.

This action guide explains the characteristics and organizational factors of pre-identified early adopter Health Centers that facilitated medical-dental integration and the establishment of the Patient-Centered Health Home, along with barriers that hinder this achievement.

NNOHA partnered with the National Health Care for the Homeless Council to develop this factsheet on oral health and diabetes for patients experiencing homelessness.

Developed by the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine Group on Oral Health, the Smiles for Life curriculum is designed to enhance the role of primary care clinicians in the promotion of oral health for all age groups through the development and dissemination of high-quality educational resources.

Co-hosted by NNOHA and the Association of Clinicians for the Underserved (ACU), this webinar discusses what oral health providers can do to help their patients effectively stop smoking. Participants will learn strategies and tools that address smoking cessation and incorporate culturally and linguistically appropriate patient education.