G-1912-15917

This investment provides continued support to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) in which the Campaign for Dental Health is housed to develop a protocol for pediatricians to integrate preventive oral health care into primary care settings. For the past few years, the Campaign for Dental Health (Campaign) has been housed at the American Academy of Pediatrics. The Campaign has been our primary national partner around community water fluoridation (CWF) – both protecting it and providing resources and tools to network partners to expand it. In 2019, the focus of the grant shifted to better engage pediatricians around oral health. The Campaign had not yet leveraged its position with AAP and the 2019 grant integrated objectives to engage, inform, and increase pediatricians’ involvement in oral health. Last year, the Campaign developed an Oral Health Prevention Primer and conducted trainings through state chapter meetings (reaching just under 200 pediatricians) to gather feedback and get upgrades for the primer (supported by Colgate). Grant funds were also used to maintain the CWF resources, the website Ilikemyteeth.org, hosting a small annual meeting, and providing ongoing support to the rapid response network that can be mobilized in times of threat. The current proposal represents an extension of the 2019 activities. Specifically, the Campaign will develop a protocol for pediatricians to integrate preventive oral health care into primary care settings. In 2020, the Campaign will introduce a population health approach to addressing oral health with a pilot project in 3-5 pediatric primary care offices to assess patient panels and then develop/implement an intervention. Lessons learned will be used to develop a guide that can be scaled to pediatric and other primary care settings where children are seen. Other activities include supporting content development for materials to engage consumers around their oral health, providing resources and support to newly added Chapter Oral Health Advocates, and maintaining tools in support of CWF. $174,928 will be used to support staff time, meeting and travel expenses, support for participating clinics in the pilot, website upgrades and maintenance, and other administrative costs associated with the proposal’s implementation.