New Managed Care Study Findings Reported from Ohio State University (Examining clinical, patient, and policy factors associated with silver diamine fluoride adoption in safety-net dental clinics): Managed Care

2025 DEC 26 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Investigators publish new report on Managed Care. According to news originating from Columbus, Ohio, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “Increasingly, dentists are using silver diamine fluoride (SDF) to treat caries. Reimbursement policy may play a role in clinical decision making.”

Our news journalists obtained a quote from the research from Ohio State University, “The authors examined safety-net dentists’ knowledge, attitudes, and practices related to SDF usage. A 55-item questionnaire was developed and administered electronically via the National Network for Oral Health Access listserv. The Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research guided questionnaire development, and the following 4 of 5 Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research domains were incorporated: the individual, the innovation, the inner clinical setting, and the outer setting. Questions focused on dentists’ SDF use from personal, clinical, and policy perspectives. All items used a 5-point Likert scale (ranging from 1 [strongly disagree] through 5 [strongly agree]). Descriptive statistics were used to summarize the data. Analysis included 158 responses; the response rate was 45.9%. Only 5.7% of respondents had never used SDF, and 23.4% used it more than once per day. The most common driver of SDF use was uncooperative patients (56%). Nearly two-thirds of respondents strongly agreed or agreed that their use of SDF has increased since their state Medicaid program began reimbursing for CDT 2024: Current Dental Terminology code D1354 (application of caries arresting medicament - per tooth). Respondents reported that a reasonable reimbursement amount for code D1354 was $44 (mean [SD], $43.79 [$25.07]). Medicaid reimbursement policy has some influence on dentists’ clinical decision making to use SDF, but clinical factors are key drivers of or barriers to use. SDF reimbursement policies can align more closely with evidence-based guidelines to support more optimal use.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “Dentists would use SDF more often if reimbursement policies had fewer limitations.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Examining clinical, patient, and policy factors associated with silver diamine fluoride adoption in safety-net dental clinics. The Journal of the American Dental Association, 2025. The Journal of the American Dental Association can be contacted at: Amer Dental Assoc, 211 E Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 60611, USA.

The news correspondents report that additional information may be obtained from Carson Richardson, Center for Biostatistics, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH. Additional authors for this research include Callihan Clayton, Juan Peng, Katelyn Whitlatch and Beau Meyer.

The publisher’s contact information for the The Journal of the American Dental Association is: Amer Dental Assoc, 211 E Chicago Ave, Chicago, IL 60611, USA.

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