Maine medical residents receive dental care training to address state dentist shortage

Mar 4 2009

The New York Times on Tuesday examined how "[d]entists are in such short supply in Maine that primary care doctors who do their medical residency in the state are learning to lance abscesses, pull teeth and perform other basic dental skills through a program that began in 2005."

Maine has one dentist for every 2,300 people, compared with one physician for every 640 people. The gap is expected to widen as professionals in both fields retire over the next 10 years. Nationwide, there is one dentist for every 1,600 people. According to the Times, Maine has trouble attracting dentists because many young graduates do not want to work in rural areas. In addition, Maine does not have a dental school.

Maine physicians who train in dentistry provide a "dental safety net" for low-income, rural patients who never had a dentist, the Times reports. About two-thirds of medical residents who have trained at a dental clinic now practice in the state, and many in rural areas. Andrew Fletcher, a Northern Maine Medical Center physician who learned dentistry at Maine Dartmouth during his residency, said, "I see dental complaints all the time from people who come into the E.R. It's mostly Medicaid patients who don't have money to see dentists."

Last year, the American Dental Association and the American Academy of Pediatrics announced another program to train pediatricians to apply fluoride and look for signs of tooth decay, which other states including Illinois, Iowa, North Carolina and Washington already have implemented. The Maine Dental Association supports educating primary care physicians in dentistry techniques, but Executive Director Frances Miliano said she would prefer that the state recruit more dentists. She said, "Medical residents are only going to be doing this in really dire circumstances." She added, "They're not going to be the alternatives to dentists in rural areas. It's not a total solution by any means" (Zezima, New York Times, 3/3).