Dental Practices Can Ensure Equal Care is Provided to All Individuals

A new study looked at North American trends in medical and dental care, with a greater focus upon Canada where there is a wide range of different cultures who should have access to the same treatment as the rest of the population, but seems to struggle.

In many cases it is a language issue that creates a barrier – those who do not speak English comfortably may struggle to make an appointment and have a strong grasp of the information provided to them when they do get in to see a dentist. In other cases, it is cultural limitations that resides with those who have immigrated; in many Middle Eastern, and Asian countries women do not have the same rights as men and may be less likely to take control over their health and ensuring it’s a priority.

In the dental industry there are a number of things that dental practices can do to ensure all members of society have equal access to dental care.

1)   Don’t discriminate – regardless of whether the person calling to make an appointment seems to have an accent or something that sets them apart, appointments should be distributed equally. It’s a sad reality that this is still an issue in this day and age, but statistics prove it to be the case

2)     Make all patients feel comfortable – all individuals deserve the same respect and level of care in the dental office. However, dental staff should also recognize that some women from other cultures may not feel as though they are deserving of equal care. Make it clear that their health is of the utmost of importance to you  and that they deserve the opportunity to focus on their own health

3)     Local government agencies should provide support – dentist offices can’t do it all, local agencies need to provide information about the oral care available to them and even provide lists of practices accepting patients to encourage those new to North America to access the resources available

This entry was posted on Friday, April 2nd, 2010 at 8:31 pm and is filed under dental news. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.