About Oral Disability Rescue
At least 1.3 million American nursing home residents face the greatest barriers to accessing dental care and suffer in silence as their oral health and dental needs are being neglected. Unfortunately, oral diseases are underestimated, ignored, or not detected until far too late, resulting in increased morbidity and/or mortality. Several studies have reported that, poor oral hygiene, inadequate denture stabilization, and many other dental/oral problems could result in medical problems associated with systemic and chronic diseases, such as oral cancer, cardiovascular disease, respiratory infections, diabetic complications, malnutrition, depression, and dementia. All older adults deserve to have access to adequate dental prevention and care. We urgently need your help in order to start helping older adults in your community. Please call us at (858) 771-6376 or send us an email to info@oraldisabilityrescue.org.
Oral Disability Rescue (ODR), a not-for-profit organization, is a group of volunteer dentists, dental hygienists, dental assistants, and hundreds of thoughtful American citizens that as an advocacy group, pursues several crucial objectives: 1) Help expand access to dental care for the elderly in nursing facilities and skilled nursing facilities in order to comply with federal regulations and to prevent supervised neglect as described under Title 42, Section 483.55(a) and Section 483.55(h). 2) Train the entire staff of nursing facilities, skilled nursing facilities and other RCFEs on crucial topics such as: i. How to assess the oral conditions of residents as part of the admission process ii. Proper oral hygiene methods and preventive dentistry iii. Methods to prevent bone loss and denture loss in older adults 3) Help residents find a local mobile dentist that would be visiting them at least 2 or 3 times per year. We believe that qualified dentists with training in treating older adults should visit residents, instead of obligating residents to visit the dental offices and cause an increase in transport costs for either residents or the facility/community.