The American Dental Association (ADA) aims to continually provide information to policy makers, the dental community and the public concerning the status of dental services available to Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Programs (SCHIP) enrollees.  To this end, in 2002, the ADA developed an extensive written review of each state’s Medicaid and SCHIP dental health initiatives and updated it again in 2004.  The ADA’s Internet site offers this information and a host of other resources.

To keep the information in the Compendium current in the face of rapid changes in Medicaid and SCHIP dental programs, the ADA initiated a new data collection project (questionnaire) in the spring of 2008. This new format offers substantial state-by-state detail, comparative analyses of state data, and a set of standard reports on cross-state issues of general interest also is being developed by ADA staff for public use.

Developed under the direction of the ADA’s contracted project coordinator, Don Schneider, D.D.S., M.P.H.—former Chief Dental Officer at the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and author of the 2002-2004 Compendiums— the initiative included assistance from the:

• American Academy of Pediatric Dentistry,
• American Dental Education Association,
• Association of State and Territorial Dental Directors,
• Children’s Dental Health Project,
• Medicaid/SCHIP Dental Association,
• National Academy for State Health Policy,
• National Oral Health Policy Center, and
• Oral Health America.

For more information on the data collection process, please visit our Methodology page.

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