Monday, January 10, 2022

The Rocky Mountain Region's Dental Care Shortage

December 31, 2021, data released by the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) reported that about 64.2 million Americans resided in settings or communities designated as a dental health professional shortage area (HPSA).  A dental health HPSA is a facility, population group, or geographic area where dental care access is lacking because too few dentists serve the area relative to the population size of the HPSA.  HPSAs in the five-state Rocky Mountain region accounted for approximately 4.3% of the U.S. population who lived in dental care shortage areas.  The HRSA estimates that HPSAs in the five Rocky Mountain states would need 342 additional dentists to eliminate the dental care shortage in the region.  This shortfall represented just over 3.0% of the nation's dental care shortage.  Here is a state-level look at the Rocky Mountain region's dental care shortage:

The Rocky Mountain Region's Dental Care Shortage

The Rocky Mountain Region's Dental Care Shortage


State (1) HPSAs (2) Population (3) Shortage
CO 99 1,146,685 140
ID 99 512,766 67
MT 129 354,148 50
UT 63 707,273 77
WY 30 49,008 8
Region 420 2,769,880 342
U.S. 6,803 64,236,250 11,181

(1) Designated Geographic, Population Group and Facility HPSAs with a dental care shortage
(2) Population of designated HPSAs
(3) Dental Care practitioners needed to remove HPSA Designation

Source:  Designated HPSA Quarterly Summary, 12/31/21 (HRSA)

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