G-2003-16253

This investment provides support to the National Academy for State Health Policy (NASHP) to conduct a comprehensive analysis of state Medicaid contracts and guidance documents to identify opportunities for states to promote medical/dental integration and overall health by addressing the social determinants of oral health. In previous years, NASHP has partnered with DQP to explore policy options for integrating oral health into care for chronic or high-cost medical conditions in order to broaden and enrich effective solutions to integrate oral health into overall health and, most recently, analyze innovative state policy options for integrating oral health into primary care models, with a focus on workforce innovations. Social determinants of health came up as an ongoing question in their 2019 work, especially after exploring Minnesota’s work to deploy community health workers to address oral health equity and ultimately promote access to oral health care by traditionally underserved communities. In 2020, NASHP proposes to analyze how Medicaid agencies’ contracting strategies (e.g. managed care plan, accountable care entities) address social determinants of health (SDOH) and their application to oral health; and how Medicaid dental contractors may coordinate or align with health contractors to address SDOH and promote overall health. Specifically, NASHP will conduct a 50-state environmental scan and review of state Medicaid health and dental contracts for SDOH language and requirements; summarize policies in a chart (and/or map) and post to NASHP’s website and fact sheet (conducting up to three interviews with state policymakers with emerging or promising SDOH efforts for oral health as needed to inform the fact sheet); develop a dissemination strategy that includes NASHP’s networks, OPEN and a related convening session (potentially virtual). $100,000 will be used to support personnel and consultants’ time, marketing or materials costs, and other administrative costs associated with the work’s implementation.