University of Colorado Denver
Campus Box 3100 Marine Street, 6th Floor
Aurora, CO 80309-0575
United States
The University of Colorado School of Dental Medicine (the University), has five dental programs, including three residencies and eight clinics on the Anschutz Medical Campus. In addition to this proposal, the University of Colorado, through a separate department and project team, submitted a proposal to the CareQuest Institute Disability Inclusion and Justice Request for Proposals (RFP) that was recently approved. Still, the dental school has not received funding from CareQuest Institute since 2018.
The proposed project will build on the American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) white paper that the CareQuest Institute Analytics and Data Insights team produced in 2022. The University will seek to survey 250 American Indian adults to assess whether perceived discrimination influences dental care utilization. The survey will leverage a variety of validated measures, including some for the State of Oral Health Equity in America. Following the survey, the University will conduct focus group interviews with 30 AI/AN adults who live on the Pine Ridge reservation to solicit perspectives on additional issues that are barriers to care for this population. This project's goals are to 1) strengthen community voice through partnerships with the AI community on Pine Ridge, 2) test a theoretical framework that proposes that perceived discrimination impacts the trust of dental providers as well as dental fear and anxiety, ultimately leading to limited use of dental services, 3) solicit AI community perspectives on barriers to utilization of dental care, and 4) dissemination of results from the assessment.
To successfully execute this project, the University will prioritize authentic relationship building at Pine Ridge, which involves participating in community events and showing up regularly. While the utilization rates among the AI/AN population is lower than other racial/ethnic groups, this project will collect quantitative and qualitative data that sheds light on the reasons for this utilization as well as barriers this population continues to face when attempting to access care. The University will work very closely with the Tribal Review Board to ensure that community members are not misrepresented as well as Indian Health Services (IHS) to develop training in cultural humility, trauma-informed care, and whole-person care for IHS dentists. At the end of the project period, the University and its Pine Ridge community partners will have discussed and recorded key data to inform discussions around how oral health care should and can be promoted and integrated in a culturally responsive and trauma-informed way.
The University's proposal includes a request for $150,000, which will be used primarily to support project staff ($91,000). Funding will also be used to hire research staff within the Pine Ridge community, pay for research-related expenses, and compensate participants for their time. All remaining funds will be leveraged for supplies and fees associated with communications and travel. The University is supporting this project through software access and technology supplies. Overall, grant funding at the requested amount is recommended and is equivalent to less than 1% of the organization's overall budget.