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From the January 2, 2004 print edition
Tri-Valley Herald
Hayward values a nice smile
Dental care a top concern for residents of Ashland
Tasha Bartholomew
Ashland - When it comes to personal care, there’s one thing health officials learned is most important to area residents - their smiles.
Last New Year’s Eve, members of Ashland Health Collaborative made a resolution to address the health care needs of the community.
The collaborative, formed a year ago, is a combination of nonprofit organizations, health care providers and social service who want to identify Ashland’s health concerns, assess the services available to the community and ultimately find ways to best meet the residents’ needs.
In doing so, collaborative members found that having dental insurance was one thing high on everybody’s priority list, said Cassandra Phelps, a collaborative spokeswoman.
Participants in the collaborative include Safe Ashland, Eden Township Health care District, Kaiser Permanente, St Rose Hospital, San Leandro Hospital, San Leandro Hospital, Tiburcio Vasquez Health clinic, Alameda County Department of Public Health, Alameda Alliance for Health and Davis Street Community Center.
While the process has been slow, Phelps said the collaborative has a few things in the works to help community members who have little or no dental insurance over the next year.
For Example, the collaborative wants to establish a directory of local dentists who currently are taking new patients and accept Denta-Cal - government assisted dental insurance for low-income families.
In addition, they want to get the Tooth Mobile out to the Ashland area at least four times in the next 12 months for routine check-ups, Phelps said.
Tooth Mobile is a Santa Clara-based nonprofit organization that provides affordable and accessible mobile dental care. But the cost to get a mobile visit is not inexpensive, she said. In fact, it’s about $2,500 each time it comes to the area.
San Leandro Hospital spokeswoman Bettylu Smith said she worked with other collaborative members to get a $5,000 grant from Triad Hospitals, Inc., which owns Sa Leandro Hospital, to help pay for some of the visits.