Advancing Oral Health, Empowering Communities

The National Dental Association is dedicated to promoting oral health equity, supporting dental professionals, and advancing access to care in underserved communities.

One of the ideals that HECTA is looking to elevate is the important and vital connection between clinical professions and dentistry. The lack of access to regular oral healthcare can exacerbate health issues and illnesses to fatal levels. When faced with making cuts in their healthcare, many individuals forego their dental healthcare.African Americans see higher rates of morbidity and mortality due to diabetes, cardiovascular disease, pulmonary disease, and poor perinatal outcomes that often have connections with poor oral health.

The purpose of HECTA is to elevate oral-systemic health as critical for the overall health and wellbeing of African American populations, and to create a joint action plan and a unified voice to address oral-systemic health as a driver for whole-body health. We envision those discussions would lead to the development of a consensus statement for oral-systemic health with a purpose to address racial and ethnic health disparities. Additional goals of the task force are:

• Elevate and amplify the oral-systemic health connection among African American providers in different health professional disciplines;
• Promote standards of excellence that include quality oral health as a standard of care;
• Identify opportunities in health professions’ licensure to include oral health competencies that elevate the oral-systemic link, and with attention to sustainable approaches to address racial and ethnic health disparities; and
• Accelerate medical-dental integration by identifying and elevating promising models of values-based care that address the oral-systemic health link, and with attention to sustainable approaches to address racial and ethnic health disparities.

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The HECTA task force will begin with a virtual focus group to be held on April 21, 2025. The group will meet in person on Friday, May 16th, 2025 in Washington, DC (transportation, meals and lodging provided – book lodging here). From there, the calendar of meetings will be set with meetings held monthly through the summer. We look to culminate the work of the task force with a national town hall in September 2025.

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If you would like more information on being a part of the task force, please email Marcus Ware, Executive Director for the National Dental Association, at this Email.