AppHealthCare takes teeth seriously. That’s why they’re taking their show on the road with a portable dental clinic.
Regular preventative dental care could save the country as much as $1.7 billion in emergency room costs, according to the American Dental Association. But folks in rural regions have a harder time getting regular healthcare from dentists. So AppHealthCare, the tri-county public health department that covers Alleghany, Ashe and Watauga counties, is using a grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to bring dentists right to the people’s doors.
Our state desperately needs innovative solutions like this to address the rural healthcare shortage — both for the good of our citizens and for the good of everyone’s fiscal health. It costs a lot less to visit the dentist twice a year than it does to extract an abscessed tooth. When rural hospitals foot these bills for patients without insurance, they risk closure; when insurance companies pay a lot of these costs, they’re forced to raise premiums. So the best thing for everyone’s wallet and everyone’s health is to make sure all North Carolinians have access to the care they need to begin with.
In other words: Thanks, AppHealthCare! Keep pushing us forward.
Read about the portable dental clinic program here.
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