Medicaid and Dental Care – Colorado

Dental treatment not reaching most Medicaid-eligible youth, By Jeffrey A. Roberts, February 10, 2013, The Coloradoan: “When she was 3, Torrie Smith tripped on an uneven sidewalk, fell face down onto some steps and broke four front teeth. An emergency room doctor stopped the bleeding and gave her something for the pain, but Torrie didn’t get to a dentist for six months — her first time ever to a dentist — because her parents didn’t have dental insurance and didn’t have cash to pay for an examination. Now 4, Torrie’s dental problems are so severe she has to go to an operating room, not a dentist’s chair, to have them fixed. While she is under anesthesia, an abscessed incisor will be pulled and nine other cavity-ravaged teeth will be pulled or treated. Torrie’s toothaches, along with the risk and high cost associated with curing them, probably could have been avoided. She is like many children in low-income families in Colorado who rarely, if ever, see a dentist even though they can go for free…”