The Community Health Center of New Britain's Start Smiling Program is on a 10-school tour of city elementary schools, trying out a new form of mobile dentistry for the first full year. The program's open to all students, but is aimed at the poor and uninsured.

Stacy Gorman, CHC's mobile dental hygienist, arrived at the Northend Elementary School in New Britain two weeks ago. Within an hour, all the equipment had been rolled up the ramp into the school -- A cart of dental power tools, a filing cabinet, plastic storage containers, a foldable dentist's chair, and a big, yellow, toothy stuffed animal.

"OK, we're going to paint some jelly on your teeth," Gorman told Christina Sweeney as she sat quietly in the dental chair during a recent visit. Christina, who's 7, was one of the 10 students Gorman treats each day for cleanings and sealant work.

"It tickled," reported Christina, choosing a sticker and prize pencil before heading back to class.

Gorman spends one month at each school, reaching about 10 percent of each school's population -- primarily kids on state insurance (HUSKY A) who wouldn't otherwise be served. Some of the kids had cavities so big that the school nurse could see big holes in their molars with the naked eye.

At one New Britain school, a whopping 49 percent of the students who came through Start Smiling's dental office had untreated cavities.

Start Smiling is part of a statewide movement begun in the 1990s towards school-based dental programs. School-based dental care, like this dental van in New Haven and this clinic in Hartford, makes going to the dentist's office just about as hassle-free as possible. The whole trip from class to dental chair and back takes less than half an hour. Kids are cared for in a familiar environment. Parents don't have to miss work to play chauffeur.

Click here to read more about children's dental, and how you can help.

At a time when kids miss more days of school for dental pain than for asthma, the service is vital, argued Jesse White-Frese, the Start Smiling project director. White-Frese gave her pitch this week as to why the newest mobile program might serve as a model for other cities.

Why it Works

The program's tied to a community health center. (CHC has one in New Britain.) Since HUSKY reimbursement rates are higher for federally recognized community health centers than for private practice dentists, the affiliation proves key. HUSKY kids are served for free; kids with no insurance pay $30 per cleaning, less than a quarter of what they'd pay at a private dentist.

The health center connection also means kids with cavities can be referred to a clinic for cavity or root-canal work, and can still get care after Gorman heads to another school.

Compared to mobile dental vans, the overhead costs of Start Smiling are relatively low, says White-Frese: Equipment, including X-ray tools, costs only about $26,000. The whole program -- which has one dental hygienist, two case coordinators, a program director and a program manager -- costs about $200,000.

Start Smiling got its funding from a five-year grant from the Connecticut Health Foundation through the New Britain Oral Health Collaborative to support kids' dental care. (Full disclosure: The group also funds the nonprofit that runs this website).

While dental vans sometimes generate their own electricity, this dental program cuts that cost by hooking into school heat and electricity. The dental hygienist sets up shop inside the school -- in this case, the nurse's office.

All it takes is convincing the school system to share its space for a month.

Northend Principal Elsa Saavedra wasn't sold at first. "One of my concerns was how much instruction would be lost" when kids duck out of class for dental visits. But the program turned out to be unobtrusive, she said. And she's happy the school can now provide another service at parents' request.

"I would definitely invite them here again."