Rowson Punti-Vasquez, age 5, looks like a rock star in his dark sunglasses.
“Open real big like an alligator,” Robin Zeigler, dental hygienist, tells him.
Rowson tilts his head back and opens wide, exposing the pink ridge of his upper gum where two teeth are missing.
Zeigler applies a fluoride resin-colored varnish, using a tiny brush, on his remaining teeth. It smells like bubble gum.
“Have you ever had vitamins painted on your teeth before?” she asks him.
He shakes his head no.
“It may not taste real good,” Zeigler warns, before he closes his mouth.
Rowson presses his lips together, purses them slightly, says nothing.
“How does it taste?” she asks.
“Fine,” he says, with great composure.
Behind him, Rowson’s fellow classmates at the Head Start at Hanthorn Child and Family Learning Center in Independence, await their turns.
They sit side-by-side in a row of miniature chairs, as still as 5-year-olds can manage to be. When the next child rises to see the “alligator lady,” they scooch one chair closer to Zeigler. Most of the children remember her because in March, she visited the school with “Ali”, a green stuffed alligator, and a pen light.
Zeigler uses Ali, as well as the pen light, to teach children how to open their mouths wide for oral health screenings and fluoride varnish treatments.
She is one of many hygienists involved in Project Ready Smile, a new initiative that seeks to improve the oral health of low-income children, ages birth to age 6. The goal is to reach 4,000 preschoolers over a three-year period so they can begin kindergarten with healthy teeth and mouths.
The project is funded by the REACH Healthcare Foundation and the Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City. Together, the foundations have committed $500,000 for the first year.
Children enrolled in participating Head Start and early childhood facilities in six counties in Missouri and Kansas, will receive free oral health screenings, fluoride applications twice a year and oral health education.
Children who need oral health care, will be referred to a network of dentists willing to treat children living in poverty.
Currently, 40 area dentists have joined the program. Families without insurance or the money to pay for dental care, and who are ineligible for the state’s children’s health insurance program (SCHIP), will receive services free.
Project Ready Smile also is being offered at two other early childhood centers in Independence – Head Start-Hawthorne Place and Ready Set Grow. Together, the three sites serve more than 400 children.
Zeigler says she is surprised to find that the children she has seen in Independence, do not have a lot of tooth decay.
“There’s no fluoride in Independence water,” she says. “Usually, that means we see a lot more decay.”
Zeigler says early intervention at Head Start is making a positive difference in children’s oral health.
“Head Start is doing a good job in getting kids to the dentist and getting them treatment,” she says.
Karen Clapper, a nurse at Head Start-Hanthorn, says that’s because all children receive a dental exam when they begin school and practice oral hygiene twice-a-day while attending school.
“Dental health is part of the school’s curriculum,” she says. “Every day, they come in and have breakfast, and depending upon the teacher, afterward they either brush or swish and swallow,” she says. “Then after lunch, they reverse the process. Those who brushed after breakfast, swish and swallow, and those who swished and swallowed, brush.”
Clapper says Head Start also encourages parents to have their children brush their teeth at home in the morning and in the evening.
“Education is key in letting parents know how important dental health is,” she says. ““Even though children still have their baby teeth, it’s still important to keep them healthy because it’s telling how their adult teeth will be.”
The REACH Foundations and The Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City
The REACH Healthcare Foundation is a nonprofit charitable organization dedicated to improving access to health care for persons who are poor and underserved through financial support of effective programs. The foundation’s funding area covers Jackson, Lafayette and Cass counties in Missouri, and Wyandotte, Johnson and Allen counties in Kansas. For more information, visit www.reachhealth.org.
The Health Care Foundation of Greater Kansas City strives to improve access and quality of health for medically indigent and underserved individuals and communities by providing financial support and leadership toward all aspects of health in Kansas City, Mo., and the six-county service area shared with the REACH Foundation. For more information, visit www.healthcare4kc.org.
Why are the Foundations funding a children’s oral health project?
“Oral health is critical to good health overall. Oral infections and diseases can contribute to missed school days and poor performance in school, low self-esteem in children and adults, and even life-threatening health problems. This initiative advances the Foundations’ shared goals of increasing access to health services and reducing health disparities for poor and minority individuals,” according to the REACH Foundation.
