Social determinants of health (SDOH) impact overall health, well-being, and quality of life. Poverty lowers educational levels and limits access to healthcare which can result in increased health disparities. A systematic review has suggested that a combination of oral health education and promotion programs is more effective than oral health education alone. While most children have access to dental care through SCHIP, many are still experiencing a higher level of dental caries despite sealant placements. This project provided an IPE opportunity to nursing and dental graduate students using educational interactive activities with low income, minority elementary school age children. Goals were to introduce dental and nursing students to IPE through community engagement and experiential learning, and educate low-income Hispanic elementary school-aged children about oral and nutrition health.
Curriculum was designed around IPE core competencies, SDOH and consisted of culturally relevant oral and nutrition interactive activities. A pre-post survey was used to evaluate outcomes for both the children and graduate students. The dental and nursing students completed SDOH and IPE modules prior to the educational activities.
The fifth-grade student sample strongly agreed that healthy and clean dentition (p=0.033) and diet related to oral health (p=0.0013) were important and identified that dental visits were important (p= 0.0071) with a stronger female fifth grade to male difference (p= 0.0435).
The graduate student results indicated that SDOH influence oral health and needs consideration regarding the delivery of oral/health care (p= 0.010) and significant association (p= 0.030) between the student views of educating this population regarding oral health. Again, more females IPE students strongly agreed in these responses compared with their male counterparts (p= 0.043).
Providing interactive oral and nutritional health activities to school age children can positively influence attitudes and behaviors and improve health outcomes.
Funding provided by LINC: Linking Interprofessional Networks for Collaboration
Disclosures:
In accordance with the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education’s Standards for Commercial Support, adopted by the Joint Accreditors for Interprofessional Continuing Education, the National Center for Interprofessional Practice and Education has a conflict of interest policy that requires that all individuals involved in the development of activity content disclose their relevant financial relationships with commercial interests. All potential conflicts of interest that arise based upon these financial relationships are resolved prior to the educational activity.
Adelita Cantu, Rebekah Salt, Sadie Trammell Velasquez, David Ojeda Diaz, Diane Ferguson, Debbie Chang, Jeff Jackson, Cristina Grijalva, Stephanie de Sam Lazaro, Adele Della Torre, Jayne-Marie Raponi, Amy Blue, Kiran Lukose, Kelly Lockeman, Tina Gunaldo, Sharon Lanning, Michelle McGregor, Jessica Owens
declare no vested interest in or affiliation with any commercial interest offering financial support for this interprofessional continuing education activity, or any affiliation with a commercial interest whose philosophy could potentially bias their presentation.
