NASHVILLE, Tenn.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Could 26, 2022–
Delta Dental of Tennessee (Delta Dental) and its charitable arm, the Smile180 Basis, have acknowledged outgoing Tennessee Well being Commissioner Dr. Lisa Piercey with its third-ever Smile Energy Award. The award, which celebrates a person who has made a big constructive influence on the oral well being of Tennesseans, was given to Dr. Piercey in recognition of her stewardship of the state’s new 5-year, $94 million pilot program to develop entry to dental care generally known as the Wholesome Smiles Initiative . Click on right here to view a video of the award presentation.
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“Too typically folks deal with oral well being as a separate concern, and I’ve to remind them that your mouth is linked to the remainder of your physique,” stated Dr. Phil Wenk, CEO of Delta Dental. “However Commissioner Piercey understood the significance and urgency of addressing our dental disaster in Tennessee from the beginning, and performed a crucial function within the growth and supreme approval of the Wholesome Smiles Initiative. Generations of Tennesseans will profit from her management, and I can’t consider a greater or extra deserving recipient of this award.”
On the request of Governor Invoice Lee, Commissioner Piercey convened a gaggle of dental business stakeholders from throughout the state in early 2021 to develop suggestions to extend entry to high-quality, reasonably priced dental look after Tennesseans. The workgroup, which included dentists, dental hygienists, the state’s two dental colleges, TennCare, the Division of Well being, payors, security web clinics, and others, settled on a complete set of proposals that turned the Wholesome Smiles Initiative.
The main parts of the Wholesome Smiles Initiative are an enlargement of dental college class sizes, new and strengthened workforce recruitment and retention efforts, and elevated security web funding. Two present, confirmed security web applications will obtain a big enhance: the Smile On 65+ program, which gives oral well being care and case administration companies for older adults, and the prosthodontic grant program, which has thus far helped present greater than 2,300 Tennesseans seen in safety-net clinics with low- or no-cost dentures. A kind of Tennesseans is Samantha, a 33-year-old single mother of three from Paris, Tennessee who obtained life-saving care at Interfaith Dental Clinic.
“All the pieces we do on the Division of Well being goes again to our mission assertion – to guard, promote, and enhance the well being and prosperity of individuals in Tennessee,” stated Dr. Piercey. “The Wholesome Smiles Initiative checks all of these packing containers – even and particularly prosperity – as a result of in the event you don’t have a wholesome smile, you will have hassle discovering and retaining a job, definitely one which aligns along with your abilities and capabilities.”
“A number of people don’t acknowledge how entry to dental care additionally impacts one other crucial concern in Tennessee: rural hospital sustainability,” Piercey added. “With no dentist close by, you find yourself with extra people within the emergency room with points that might and may have been addressed by a dentist. And whereas the hospital has to – and needs to – look after anybody who walks into the ER, they’re getting reimbursed little or no, if something, for these companies.”
Earlier than her appointment by Governor Lee in January 2019, Dr. Piercey, a board-certified little one abuse pediatrician, spent a decade working in well being techniques operations, most lately with West Tennessee Healthcare, a public, not-for-profit well being system with greater than 7,000 staff servicing 22 counties. She has continued to see sufferers in her pediatric follow in Jackson, Tennessee, as soon as every week all through her service as Commissioner.
Piercey is the third recipient of the Smile Energy Award. The late State Consultant Charles Sargent, a champion of oral well being points together with the denture grant program, obtained the inaugural Smile Energy Award in 2018. Former Tennessee Insurance coverage Commissioner Julie Combine McPeak was honored in 2019 for her work in assist of the creation of Dental Dental’s Smile180 Basis.
The Smile180 Basis has donated greater than $21.5 million to Tennessee’s dental schools, kids’s hospitals, free and reduced-cost dental clinics, and different like-minded charities since its creation in 2015.
To study extra about Delta Dental’s philanthropic work throughout Tennessee, go to the Smile180 Basis web site.
Delta Dental of Tennessee
Delta Dental of Tennessee is the state’s largest impartial dental advantages service with almost 1.4 million lives coated. As a part of the Delta Dental Plans Affiliation, Delta Dental of Tennessee members have entry to the most important dental community within the nation with greater than 154,000 suppliers serving greater than 437,000 areas. With the easy mission of guaranteeing wholesome smiles, Delta Dental of Tennessee works laborious to assist members of the communities it serves. Together with its company basis, Smile180, Delta Dental of Tennessee donated greater than $5.4 million in funding and in-kind companies to over 130 organizations in 2021.
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CONTACT: Ann Waller Curtis
annwaller.curtis@stonesrivergroup.com
KEYWORD: UNITED STATES NORTH AMERICA TENNESSEE
INDUSTRY KEYWORD: WOMEN SENIORS MEN STATE/LOCAL INSURANCE FAMILY CONSUMER HOSPITALS PROFESSIONAL SERVICES FOUNDATION PHILANTHROPY DENTAL PUBLIC POLICY/GOVERNMENT HEALTH OTHER EDUCATION HEALTHCARE REFORM CONTINUING TRAINING EDUCATION
SOURCE: Delta Dental of Tennessee
Copyright Enterprise Wire 2022.
PUB: 05/26/2022 05:38 PM/DISC: 05/26/2022 05:38 PM
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