Indiana Dental Health Needs Assessment
SERVICES PROVIDED: Needs Assessment, Report, Interviews, Focus Groups, Surveys, Digital Directory
FUNDERS: AWS Foundation and Delta Dental of Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, and North Carolina
Adults with disabilities face barriers to good dental health, which can negatively affect their physical, mental, and social health. To understand more about the needs of adults with disabilities, their caregivers, and dental professionals in Indiana, we went straight to the source. We conducted focus groups, interviews, and surveys with these groups to discover where current dental health educational resources are lacking and how we can fill those gaps.
We developed a report to detail the findings from the literature on related topics, the current state of dental health and disabilities, who our participants were, and a summary of what they told us.
In addition to the report, we also developed a directory of dental offices throughout Indiana that accept Medicaid and work with patients with disabilities. This directory was the result of a “secret shopper” survey we conducted to learn more about the experiences of adults with disabilities and their caregivers when seeking out dental health care. Pieces developed include:
