North Texas Dentistry Volume 5 Issue 3 | Page 14

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TDA news

Texas Dental Association:
The Patient’s Advocate

T

by Dr. William H. Gerlach
Texas Dental Association Board of Directors, Northeast Senior Director

he Texas Dental Association (TDA) seeks to reduce the
number of adults and children with untreated dental
disease through oral health education and prevention,
and by providing treatment now to people in need of care. The
goal is to make Texans healthier through access to a dentist.

As of January 2015, there were 16,111 dentists delivering comprehensive dental care to Texans including children, adults, elderly, and disabled.1 Approximately 500-800 new dentists enter
Texas’ workforce each year, which is leading to a steady
decrease in the number of underserved areas of the state since
2009.2 The growth of dentists in Texas mirrors the national
trend. The American Dental Association (ADA) predicts that
dental school graduations will exceed dentist retirements. The
net increase of practicing dentists will exceed the corresponding
14 NORTH TEXAS DENTISTRY | www.northtexasdentistry.com

growth of the U.S. population. An October 2014 report by the
ADA’s Health Policy Institute shows the number of dentists
practicing per 100,000 people has climbed more than 4% from
2003 to 2013 and is projected to climb 1.5% from 2013 to 2018
and 2.6% by 2033.3

Although Texas does have the largest underserved population
in the country, Texas ranks high in terms of the percentage of
the underserved whose dental needs are being met, at 64%.
Texas also ranks high nationally in the number of dentists
needed in underserved areas in order to meet 100% of the need:
354 dentists.4 The number of additional dentists needed represents less than 3% of the total dental workforce in the state. Let’s
focus on getting dentists into underserved areas by focusing
attention and resources on proven, cost-effective approaches of