AcademyHealth’s Oral Health Interest Group is set to revive at the Baltimore Annual Research Meeting. A dedicated session on June 29th, 2024, from 2:15 pm to 3:30 pm titled Setting the Global Oral Health Agenda: Research, Policy & Beyond will provide a platform for discussing how to rejuvenate the interest group and develop strategies for advancing oral health policy and integration with medicine.
Inspired by the success of the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Global Oral Health Symposium 2023 and building on the momentum from a collaborative session at the American Public Health Association meeting in Atlanta 2023, our session fostered a vibrant interdisciplinary discourse. The symposium demonstrated the effectiveness of multidisciplinary approaches in advancing oral health policy and education, setting a benchmark for future efforts.
Historic Perspective. Dr. Sujay Mehta introduced the session with dental education’s historic silo beginning in 1840 Baltimore. He emphasized this separation of dentistry from general medicine and the implications for health services research and policy. He outlined recent calls to action for integrating oral health with medicine and public health and recognized the role of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore to continue work towards integrating the mouth into health care.
Economic Lens. Dr. Kevin Frick provided a compelling analysis of oral health through an economic perspective, illustrating the financial barriers that impede access, availability, and affordability of dental care. The complex interplay and the interdependence of these factors, the broader economic implications of poor oral health reinforce the need for cross-sectoral collaborations beyond silos.
Global Perspectives. IfeOluwa Adetula from the ZeroNOMA Initiative highlighted the global burden of noma, recently recognized as a neglected tropical disease. NOMA is fatal gangrene that affects the mouth and face and devastates children in impoverished communities. His discussion underscored the moral and ethical imperative to address neglected diseases and integrate them into global health strategies with on-the-ground early recognition strategies.
Global to ‘Glocal’. Drawing from her experiences with Solidarity Dental and the Village Life Outreach Project, Dr. Priyanka Gudsoorkar presented oral health analysis from local to global perspectives essential for comprehending and addressing oral health disparities. She reinforced the impact of global health strategic lessons with applications to domestic challenges in underserved Indigenous communities in the United States.