Forwarding Public Oral Health with Theoretically Framed Partnerships, Planning, Programs, and Policies

Background:  In 1988 and 2003, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) called for agency/academic partnerships to ensure public health’s future effectiveness. Our state responded to the IOM call in 2006 when the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control, Division of Oral Health (DOH) began a partnership with the South Carolina Rural Health Research Center (SCRHRC), Arnold School of Public Health, University of South Carolina. 

Methods:  In 2006, DOH and SCRHRC used a collaborative leadership model, engaging the SC Oral Health Advisory Council and Coalition, to develop a 5-year state oral health plan.  The SCRHRC facilitated the planning process using PRECEDE-PROCEED as the framework.  A comprehensive evaluation approach was used with state the Oral Health Needs Assessment (OHNA) serving as one of our epidemiological score cards.

Results:  By 2013, the partnership demonstrated significant oral health program, policy and oral health status improvements during a time of government retraction.  The DOH-SCRHRC partnership has leveraged $5,220,000 in extramural funding for oral health programs. Numerous policy and programmatic successes have manifested in the recent OHNA, which demonstrated improvements in caries experiences and sealants, and a reduction in children with untreated caries from 32.2% (2002) to 12.4% (2013).  Some race and income-based disparities were ameliorated. Treatment urgency 1s were cut in half and 2s were nearly eradicated.

Conclusion: During a time of governmental downsizing, South Carolina’s strategic public health-academic partnership has leveraged philanthropic and federal resources to demonstrably impact the oral health status of the state’s most vulnerable populations.