According to the Surgeon General, tooth decay is the single-most common childhood disease — five times more common than asthma. Underprivileged children are twice as likely to suffer this disease than their more affluent counterparts and — if they lack insurance — they are two-and-a-half times less likely to receive treatment.
The result? More than 50 million school hours are missed each year due to dental-related illnesses. If left untreated, these illnesses can lead to a lifetime of abscessed teeth and problems with speech, eating and learning.
The Surgeon General laid out the severity of the problem in a report in 2000. In 2001, Kids Smiles emerged with the explicit goal of improving those statistics dramatically. The nonprofit’s strategy is twofold. First, provide children in underserved communities with preventative and restorative oral health care, and, second, launch health education programs that help kids care for their teeth.
Today, more than 60,000 children in the Philadelphia program take advantage of Kids Smiles’ dental services and more than 200,000 have benefitted from its Education and Outreach program. The program educates children on-site through the Dental Detectives Academy and also connects with children at community centers such as Head Start programs, Philadelphia schools and public health facilities.
The Dental Detectives Academy is handled by full-time educators who work in each Kids Smiles center. While kids wait for their appointment with the dentist, the educator walks them through kid-friendly oral hygiene lessons geared toward children between the ages of 4 and 12. Once a child has completed three of the 10 lessons, they are rewarded with a photo of themselves placed on a “Wall of Fame,” a book of their choice and a chance to become “teaching assistants” on their next visit.
Kids Smiles’ outreach to area schools has helped more than 15,000 students receive screening and education each year. If a child’s screening shows signs of tooth decay, a Kids Smiles hygienist follows up with his or her parents and encourages them to seek treatment. The results since 2001 have been dramatic. In many instances, Kids Smiles has been able to reduce children’s oral disease by 80 percent.