659. PORTUGAL: One in three people has never been to a dentist

658. Dental social clinic opens in Setúbal

657. The association "Mundo a Sorrir" already took care of the oral health of 33 thousand Portuguese

Between awareness projects, screening measures or treatments, the non-governmental organization Mundo a Sorrir (World Smile) - Doctors Association Dentists Portuguese Solidarity reached more than 163,000 people over its nine years of activity - with operations in Portugal and several Portuguese-speaking African countries such as Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau and Sao Tome. in Portugal, the president of the NGO said that were made almost 12,000 screenings and more than 21,000 treatments, especially vulnerable populations. Michael Peacock believes that in future, the work will increasingly focus on the health prevention in a very deprived area in the country.

In the month that the World Smile complete nine years of activity, Miguel Pavão account that the project, which was born out of a personal volunteer experience that the dentist had in Cape Verde with colleague Mariana Dolores, ended up walking to many countries and which continues to struggle for ensuring the universal right to access to oral health care, working with the high-risk groups such as the elderly, children, pregnant women or people with few financial resources. 12 initial volunteers, went to more than 600, including physicians, dentists, hygienists and nutritionists. There are still little care in terms of oral health in the country and little focus on prevention, even in nutritional terms. We have a very system focused not on the right to health but for the right to treat the disease. I think this is the great turning point that we do not treat the disease itself but look at them in an interconnected way, describes the dentist, which highlights the work done in this regard by the Programme for Inclusion and Healthy Life of the World Smile . The project, which has European funding has come through training and screenings to 54,000 children and young people and should end the year with 70,000.

Since they started working in 2005, only Portugal already have 2332 health promotion lectures and hygiene and it is precisely in non-formal education and the introduction of concepts in a playful way that the specialist believes more. Miguel Pavão, covering the country in terms of oral health has improved, especially with vouchers dentist called, attributed to some groups defined as priority by the National Oral Health Promotion Plan. The problem, he says, is that the bet has just been on the side of prevention. Only 3% of healthcare budgets in the European Union that are dedicated to the promotion and health prevention, said, exemplifying that treat oral cancer, including surgery, chemotherapy and radiation therapy, can cost 100 000 euros, a value that says that would give do training in this area throughout the country. The NGO has no direct links to the check-dentist, but the dentist says they have had a concertation logic and adapted programs to help that policies like this are best executed and without the work of volunteers overlap to what exists in State. Not everyone knows that you are entitled to checks or how to use and screenings and activities help in this direction, illustrates.

The inequities in access to oral health care continues to be a problem in Portugal, with most of the treatments to be held outside the National Health Service. In fact, in June the Regulatory Authority of Health (ERS) published a study where ruling on dental checks available to some risk groups under the National Oral Health Promotion Plan. In the document, the ERS believes that the program should be extended to children and youth in private schools and also to non-elderly beneficiaries of the solidarity supplement and even to pregnant women who are not followed in the National Health Service.

For now, only children aged 7, 10 and youth 13 and 16 years who attend public schools are entitled to receive these checks in the amount of 35 euros each. Until the age of six checks should only be given to serious cases. The study also highlights other limits of this plan, such as those relating to the setting of a maximum number of dental checks to be allocated to each group. The ERS adds, moreover, that most dentists think that the number of checks and the value of these are not compatible with the needs of the beneficiaries.

Romana Borja-Santos

PÚBLICO

   

656. New research project wants to make dental care in Europe

A new research project, funded by about 6 million euros by the European Union wants to revolutionize the practice of dentistry and oral health, shifting the focus of dental treatments for preventive practices.
According to EU data, dental treatments have an estimated cost of around 79 billion euros annually in the European Union.

The project will last four years and will be led by the University of Leeds, the Academic Centre of Dentistry Amsterdam and the University of Heidelberg. The goal is, by European health data, work together with dental professionals and insurance companies in order to identify strategies for the prevention of oral health problems in each of the European countries.

The World Health Organization has said that oral diseases are the most common chronic diseases to humans. We want to change that, says Helen Whelton, Rector of the University of Leeds and responsible for the project. The hope is that, by evaluating the performance of dental professionals, we can implement change and encourage a shift to preventive practices in dental care.

The initiative will evaluate health data from a total of eight countries such as the UK, Denmark, Germany, Hungary, Ireland and the Netherlands.

Ana Rita Costa

Saúde Oral – Revista Profissionalde Estomatologia e Medicina Dentária