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Date of Report:
01/2007
Source:
Pennsylvania/MidAtlantic AETC
As a local performance site (LPS) for the Texas/Oklahoma AETC, Baylor College of Dentistry/Texas A and M Health Science Center continually seeks to identify new ways to reach oral health care providers. Relationship building is one strategy that has proven to be extremely useful in meeting training goals. Baylor College of Dentistry LPS has been able to reach oral health care providers through relationships that have been developed with the Texas Dental Association and the Dental Oncology Education Program.
The Texas Dental Association publishes the Texas Dental Journal, which is the oldest dental periodical in the United States and the second oldest in the world. It is a peerreviewed journal that features both educational articles and information regarding important issues to the practice of dentistry in Texas. It is distributed monthly to the 7,400 member dentists across the state of Texas as a benefit of membership. Occasionally a guest editor is asked to solicit articles with a similar theme for potential publication in a particular issue.
Since 2002, the Baylor College of Dentistry LPS has taken advantage of the guest editor opportunity and has responded with one article each year, usually a Case Report and Self-Study. The article is followed by approximately ten questions for which continuing education credit can be earned by answering and submitting the appropriate documentation. A Participant Information Form (PIF) is included with each Self-Study as well. Continuing education credit is given for this independent study through the Dental Oncology Education Program (an ADA CERP recognized provider). The article along with the Self-Study and PIF is also reprinted in the Oral Disease Update, which is distributed annually to 6,800 licensed and registered dental hygienists across the state of Texas.
Last year, approximately 180 dental health care providers completed the Self-Study and submitted the required documentation to receive continuing education credit. The effort appears to be effective in disseminating information about the care of HIV/AIDS clients.
As a result of the Case Report and Self Study, follow-up discussions and clinical consultations (Level IV training) with individual dental health care providers have shown that providers use the information acquired in the Case Report and Self-Study to address the needs of their clients. Finally, dental health care providers who complete the required documentation are asked to provide an address that can be tracked for planning purposes. Future training sessions can be organized to target interested dental care providers identified by zip code (clusters) and marketing efforts can be directed toward individual providers who are often difficult to identify.
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