MOUND BAYOU — Less than 10% of adults in the Mississippi Delta went to the dentist in the last year, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
It’s a statistic the Delta’s U.S. Representative Bennie Thompson used to emphasize the difficulties people in his district face to a crowd of a few dozen people gathered in the Mound Bayou Delta Health Center parking lot late Wednesday morning.
In a recorded video, he talked about the particular risks this health care gap has on older adults, like a higher chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease.
“We know that too many seniors are going without the care they need,” he said.
The crowd he and eight others spoke to was gathered to celebrate a multimillion dollar step toward addressing that problem. The Delta Health Center — in collaboration with Greenville’s Delta Health System hospital, Mississippi State Office of Oral Health and the Bolivar County Council on Aging — received a $5 million grant through the Delta Dental Community Care Foundation’s Senior Oral Health Partnership Program to improve access to dental care for seniors in the area.
Representatives from each of the organizations said they will replace aging equipment at the Mound Bayou dental clinic, hire more oral health staff, develop new transportation options for services and conduct screenings among Delta seniors for tooth disorders.
It’s the first time Delta Dental’s foundation, the philanthropic arm of the national dental insurance company, has funded a senior oral health partnership outside of California or Washington, D.C.
Robin Boyles, chief program planning and development officer at Delta Health Center, speaks during a ceremony announcing a $5 million investment to expand oral health services at the clinic, Wednesday, May 21, 2025, in Mound Bayou, Miss. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi TodayRobin Boyles, the Delta Health Center’s development officer, said she and her coworkers thought the grant was a long shot when the application first came out.
“Five states were eligible, and they were going to fund one partnership,” she told the crowd. “…Oftentimes I would say ‘uh, no.’ But what we finally decided was, the need is great. Our need is so great here, and we have partnerships”
For instance, Boyles said, there are no dentists in Washington County who serve patients regardless of their ability to pay for care, and many residents there end up seeking oral health care at the Greenville hospital’s emergency department. The partners hope to create ways to transfer these patients to one of the Delta Health Center’s dental clinics with the help of these funds.
As a general dentist for the center, Dr. Clarke Allen sees these needs on a daily basis. She told Mississippi Today that when elderly patients come into the clinic and she asks them how long it’s been since their last dental appointment, most tell her it’s been more than five years.
Because Medicare, the federal government’s health insurance for adults 65 and over, often doesn’t cover most dental care, Clarke said clinics like hers, which offers lower priced services for underinsured and uninsured patients, need all the resources they can get. She thinks hiring more oral health clinicians with the grant’s funds will be a big help for Delta residents.
“Our patient base is huge, but we don’t have as many providers to take care of all those patients,” she said.
Clarke said she’s also excited about the ways this grant will help older adults without transportation. The Delta Health Center plans to expand its efforts to bring buses full of dental services to communities throughout the Delta, and the Bolivar County Council on Aging will help provide rides from patients’ homes to the mobile clinics.
For dental and other health care visits, medical transportation can be difficult to schedule throughout Mississippi. LaShonda McKinney, the council’s executive director, told Mississippi Today that’s why she was grateful the Delta Health Center thought of her organization and Delta residents’ transportation needs when planning out its mobile dental efforts.
“Even if you park in senior communities, how are they going to get to the mobile units?” she asked. “They have their own transportation, but we have a lot more vehicles, vehicles for individuals who may need wheelchairs or walkers.”
John A. Fairman, chief executive officer of Delta Health Center, speaks during a ceremony announcing a $5 million investment to expand oral health services at the clinic, Wednesday, May 21, 2025, in Mound Bayou, Miss. Credit: Eric Shelton/Mississippi TodayJohn Fairman, the Delta Health Center’s chief executive officer, told Mississippi Today that since its founding in 1965, his community health center has always prided itself on going beyond checkups and doctors appointments to make sure Delta residents are healthy.
He says that through addressing people’s needs beyond the walls of the Mound Bayou clinic, this grant continues that same tradition.
“We’re really excited,” he said. “Delta Dental Foundation is just a godsend.”
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