Insurance, Health
Insurance Coverage
Generally refers to the amount of protection available and the kind of loss which would be paid for under an insurance contract with an insurer. (Slee & Slee, Health Care Terms, 2d ed)
Dental Care
The total of dental diagnostic, preventive, and restorative services provided to meet the needs of a patient (from Illustrated Dictionary of Dentistry, 1982).
Insurance
Insurance, Long-Term Care
Health insurance to provide full or partial coverage for long-term home care services or for long-term nursing care provided in a residential facility such as a nursing home.
Insurance, Dental
Insurance providing coverage for dental care.
Insurance, Life
Schools, Dental
Educational institutions for individuals specializing in the field of dentistry.
Students, Dental
Dental Caries
Localized destruction of the tooth surface initiated by decalcification of the enamel followed by enzymatic lysis of organic structures and leading to cavity formation. If left unchecked, the cavity may penetrate the enamel and dentin and reach the pulp.
Insurance Carriers
Insurance Pools
Medically Uninsured
Individuals or groups with no or inadequate health insurance coverage. Those falling into this category usually comprise three primary groups: the medically indigent (MEDICAL INDIGENCY); those whose clinical condition makes them medically uninsurable; and the working uninsured.
Dental Care for Chronically Ill
Dental care for patients with chronic diseases. These diseases include chronic cardiovascular, endocrinologic, hematologic, immunologic, neoplastic, and renal diseases. The concept does not include dental care for the mentally or physically disabled which is DENTAL CARE FOR DISABLED.
Dental Care for Children
The giving of attention to the special dental needs of children, including the prevention of tooth diseases and instruction in dental hygiene and dental health. The dental care may include the services provided by dental specialists.
Dental Clinics
Facilities where dental care is provided to patients.
Insurance Selection Bias
Dental Pulp
Dental Hygienists
Faculty, Dental
Insurance Benefits
Payments or services provided under stated circumstances under the terms of an insurance policy. In prepayment programs, benefits are the services the programs will provide at defined locations and to the extent needed.
Dental Care for Disabled
Dental care for the emotionally, mentally, or physically disabled patient. It does not include dental care for the chronically ill ( = DENTAL CARE FOR CHRONICALLY ILL).
Dental Anxiety
Insurance, Health, Reimbursement
Payment by a third-party payer in a sum equal to the amount expended by a health care provider or facility for health services rendered to an insured or program beneficiary. (From Facts on File Dictionary of Health Care Management, 1988)
Dental Care for Aged
The giving of attention to the special dental needs of the elderly for proper maintenance or treatment. The dental care may include the services provided by dental specialists.
Health Benefit Plans, Employee
Health insurance plans for employees, and generally including their dependents, usually on a cost-sharing basis with the employer paying a percentage of the premium.
Dental Research
United States
The term "United States" in a medical context often refers to the country where a patient or study participant resides, and is not a medical term per se, but relevant for epidemiological studies, healthcare policies, and understanding differences in disease prevalence, treatment patterns, and health outcomes across various geographic locations.
Dental Arch
The curve formed by the row of TEETH in their normal position in the JAW. The inferior dental arch is formed by the mandibular teeth, and the superior dental arch by the maxillary teeth.
Insurance, Liability
Dental Plaque
A film that attaches to teeth, often causing DENTAL CARIES and GINGIVITIS. It is composed of MUCINS, secreted from salivary glands, and microorganisms.
Insurance, Major Medical
Insurance, Accident
Dental Offices
The room or rooms in which the dentist and dental staff provide care. Offices include all rooms in the dentist's office suite.
Dental Records
National Health Insurance, United States
National Health Insurance in the United States refers to a proposed system of healthcare financing that would provide comprehensive coverage for all residents, funded through a combination of government funding and mandatory contributions, and administered by a public agency.
Dental Staff
Universal Coverage
Health insurance coverage for all persons in a state or country, rather than for some subset of the population. It may extend to the unemployed as well as to the employed; to aliens as well as to citizens; for pre-existing conditions as well as for current illnesses; for mental as well as for physical conditions.
General Practice, Dental
Nonspecialized dental practice which is concerned with providing primary and continuing dental care.
Dental Equipment
The nonexpendable items used by the dentist or dental staff in the performance of professional duties. (From Boucher's Clinical Dental Terminology, 4th ed, p106)
Medicaid
Federal program, created by Public Law 89-97, Title XIX, a 1965 amendment to the Social Security Act, administered by the states, that provides health care benefits to indigent and medically indigent persons.
Dental Amalgam
An alloy used in restorative dentistry that contains mercury, silver, tin, copper, and possibly zinc.
Insurance, Hospitalization
Health insurance providing benefits to cover or partly cover hospital expenses.
Health Care Reform
Innovation and improvement of the health care system by reappraisal, amendment of services, and removal of faults and abuses in providing and distributing health services to patients. It includes a re-alignment of health services and health insurance to maximum demographic elements (the unemployed, indigent, uninsured, elderly, inner cities, rural areas) with reference to coverage, hospitalization, pricing and cost containment, insurers' and employers' costs, pre-existing medical conditions, prescribed drugs, equipment, and services.
Health Services Accessibility
Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act
Public Law 104-91 enacted in 1996, was designed to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the healthcare system, protect health insurance coverage for workers and their families, and to protect individual personal health information.
National Health Programs
Components of a national health care system which administer specific services, e.g., national health insurance.
Education, Dental, Continuing
Educational programs designed to inform dentists of recent advances in their fields.
Dental Implants
State Health Plans
Insurance Claim Review
Review of claims by insurance companies to determine liability and amount of payment for various services. The review may also include determination of eligibility of the claimant or beneficiary or of the provider of the benefit; determination that the benefit is covered or not payable under another policy; or determination that the service was necessary and of reasonable cost and quality.
Dentists
Individuals licensed to practice DENTISTRY.
Radiography, Dental
Radiographic techniques used in dentistry.
Private Sector
Dental Health Surveys
A systematic collection of factual data pertaining to dental or oral health and disease in a human population within a given geographic area.
Eligibility Determination
Dental Models
Presentation devices used for patient education and technique training in dentistry.
Health Expenditures
The amounts spent by individuals, groups, nations, or private or public organizations for total health care and/or its various components. These amounts may or may not be equivalent to the actual costs (HEALTH CARE COSTS) and may or may not be shared among the patient, insurers, and/or employers.
Education, Dental, Graduate
Ethics, Dental
Practice Management, Dental
Dental Service, Hospital
Hospital department providing dental care.
Societies, Dental
Societies whose membership is limited to dentists.
Technology, Dental
Fluorosis, Dental
A chronic endemic form of hypoplasia of the dental enamel caused by drinking water with a high fluorine content during the time of tooth formation, and characterized by defective calcification that gives a white chalky appearance to the enamel, which gradually undergoes brown discoloration. (Jablonski's Dictionary of Dentistry, 1992, p286)
Licensure, Dental
The granting of a license to practice dentistry.
Laboratories, Dental
Dental Materials
Financing, Personal
Payment by individuals or their family for health care services which are not covered by a third-party payer, either insurance or medical assistance.
Insurance, Physician Services
Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act
An Act prohibiting a health plan from establishing lifetime limits or annual limits on the dollar value of benefits for any participant or beneficiary after January 1, 2014. It permits a restricted annual limit for plan years beginning prior to January 1, 2014. It provides that a health plan shall not be prevented from placing annual or lifetime per-beneficiary limits on covered benefits. The Act sets up a competitive health insurance market.
Economics, Dental
Economic aspects of the dental profession and dental care.
Dental Sac
Dense fibrous layer formed from mesodermal tissue that surrounds the epithelial enamel organ. The cells eventually migrate to the external surface of the newly formed root dentin and give rise to the cementoblasts that deposit cementum on the developing root, fibroblasts of the developing periodontal ligament, and osteoblasts of the developing alveolar bone.
Dentistry
Cost Sharing
Provisions of an insurance policy that require the insured to pay some portion of covered expenses. Several forms of sharing are in use, e.g., deductibles, coinsurance, and copayments. Cost sharing does not refer to or include amounts paid in premiums for the coverage. (From Dictionary of Health Services Management, 2d ed)
Social Security
Government sponsored social insurance programs.
Insurance, Disability
Insurance designed to compensate persons who lose wages because of illness or injury; insurance providing periodic payments that partially replace lost wages, salary, or other income when the insured is unable to work because of illness, injury, or disease. Individual and group disability insurance are two types of such coverage. (From Facts on File Dictionary of Health Care Management, 1988, p207)
Esthetics, Dental
Health Insurance Exchanges
State-provided health insurance marketplaces established under the PATIENT PROTECTION AND AFFORDABLE CARE ACT.
Comprehensive Dental Care
Providing for the full range of dental health services for diagnosis, treatment, follow-up, and rehabilitation of patients.
Socioeconomic Factors
Health Education, Dental
Oral Health
Insurance, Pharmaceutical Services
Tooth Diseases
'Tooth diseases' is a broad term referring to various conditions affecting the teeth, including dental caries (cavities), periodontal disease (gum disease), tooth wear, tooth sensitivity, oral cancer, and developmental anomalies, which can result in pain, discomfort, or loss of teeth if left untreated.
Infection Control, Dental
Efforts to prevent and control the spread of infections within dental health facilities or those involving provision of dental care.
Health Care Surveys
Poverty
A situation in which the level of living of an individual, family, or group is below the standard of the community. It is often related to a specific income level.
Dental Papilla
Dental Prosthesis
An artificial replacement for one or more natural teeth or part of a tooth, or associated structures, ranging from a portion of a tooth to a complete denture. The dental prosthesis is used for cosmetic or functional reasons, or both. DENTURES and specific types of dentures are also available. (From Boucher's Clinical Dental Terminology, 4th ed, p244 & Jablonski, Dictionary of Dentistry, 1992, p643)
Health Services Needs and Demand
Health services required by a population or community as well as the health services that the population or community is able and willing to pay for.
Dental Audit
A detailed review and evaluation of selected clinical records by qualified professional personnel for evaluating quality of dental care.
Dental Instruments
DMF Index
"Decayed, missing and filled teeth," a routinely used statistical concept in dentistry.
Dental Waste
Dental Implantation
Dental Alloys
A mixture of metallic elements or compounds with other metallic or metalloid elements in varying proportions for use in restorative or prosthetic dentistry.
State Government
Dental Caries Susceptibility
Aid to Families with Dependent Children
Financial assistance provided by the government to indigent families with dependent children who meet certain requirements as defined by the Social Security Act, Title IV, in the U.S.
Dental Informatics
Preventive Dentistry
The branch of dentistry concerned with the prevention of disease and the maintenance and promotion of oral health.
Health Policy
Oral Hygiene
The practice of personal hygiene of the mouth. It includes the maintenance of oral cleanliness, tissue tone, and general preservation of oral health.
Tax Exemption
Status not subject to taxation; as the income of a philanthropic organization. Tax-exempt organizations may also qualify to receive tax-deductible donations if they are considered to be nonprofit corporations under Section 501(c)3 of the United States Internal Revenue Code.
Taiwan
Dental Occlusion
The relationship of all the components of the masticatory system in normal function. It has special reference to the position and contact of the maxillary and mandibular teeth for the highest efficiency during the excursive movements of the jaw that are essential for mastication. (From Jablonski, Dictionary of Dentistry, 1992, p556, p472)
Dental Scaling
Removal of dental plaque and dental calculus from the surface of a tooth, from the surface of a tooth apical to the gingival margin accumulated in periodontal pockets, or from the surface coronal to the gingival margin.
Health Care Costs
The actual costs of providing services related to the delivery of health care, including the costs of procedures, therapies, and medications. It is differentiated from HEALTH EXPENDITURES, which refers to the amount of money paid for the services, and from fees, which refers to the amount charged, regardless of cost.
Dentistry, Operative
That phase of clinical dentistry concerned with the restoration of parts of existing teeth that are defective through disease, trauma, or abnormal development, to the state of normal function, health, and esthetics, including preventive, diagnostic, biological, mechanical, and therapeutic techniques, as well as material and instrument science and application. (Jablonski's Dictionary of Dentistry, 2d ed, p237)
Stomatognathic Diseases
Models, Econometric
Cost Control
The containment, regulation, or restraint of costs. Costs are said to be contained when the value of resources committed to an activity is not considered excessive. This determination is frequently subjective and dependent upon the specific geographic area of the activity being measured. (From Dictionary of Health Services Management, 2d ed)
Dental Facilities
Use for material on dental facilities in general or for which there is no specific heading.
Health Care Sector
Dental Devices, Home Care
Dentist's Practice Patterns
Patterns of practice in dentistry related to diagnosis and treatment.
Photography, Dental
Logistic Models
Statistical models which describe the relationship between a qualitative dependent variable (that is, one which can take only certain discrete values, such as the presence or absence of a disease) and an independent variable. A common application is in epidemiology for estimating an individual's risk (probability of a disease) as a function of a given risk factor.
Tooth Extraction
The surgical removal of a tooth. (Dorland, 28th ed)
Federal Government
Managed Care Programs
Health insurance plans intended to reduce unnecessary health care costs through a variety of mechanisms, including: economic incentives for physicians and patients to select less costly forms of care; programs for reviewing the medical necessity of specific services; increased beneficiary cost sharing; controls on inpatient admissions and lengths of stay; the establishment of cost-sharing incentives for outpatient surgery; selective contracting with health care providers; and the intensive management of high-cost health care cases. The programs may be provided in a variety of settings, such as HEALTH MAINTENANCE ORGANIZATIONS and PREFERRED PROVIDER ORGANIZATIONS.
Medicare
Federal program, created by Public Law 89-97, Title XVIII-Health Insurance for the Aged, a 1965 amendment to the Social Security Act, that provides health insurance benefits to persons over the age of 65 and others eligible for Social Security benefits. It consists of two separate but coordinated programs: hospital insurance (MEDICARE PART A) and supplementary medical insurance (MEDICARE PART B). (Hospital Administration Terminology, AHA, 2d ed and A Discursive Dictionary of Health Care, US House of Representatives, 1976)
Molar
The most posterior teeth on either side of the jaw, totaling eight in the deciduous dentition (2 on each side, upper and lower), and usually 12 in the permanent dentition (three on each side, upper and lower). They are grinding teeth, having large crowns and broad chewing surfaces. (Jablonski, Dictionary of Dentistry, 1992, p821)
Income Tax
Tax on the net income of an individual, organization, or business.
Dental Porcelain
A type of porcelain used in dental restorations, either jacket crowns or inlays, artificial teeth, or metal-ceramic crowns. It is essentially a mixture of particles of feldspar and quartz, the feldspar melting first and providing a glass matrix for the quartz. Dental porcelain is produced by mixing ceramic powder (a mixture of quartz, kaolin, pigments, opacifiers, a suitable flux, and other substances) with distilled water. (From Jablonski's Dictionary of Dentistry, 1992)
Radiography, Dental, Digital
A rapid, low-dose, digital imaging system using a small intraoral sensor instead of radiographic film, an intensifying screen, and a charge-coupled device. It presents the possibility of reduced patient exposure and minimal distortion, although resolution and latitude are inferior to standard dental radiography. A receiver is placed in the mouth, routing signals to a computer which images the signals on a screen or in print. It includes digitizing from x-ray film or any other detector. (From MEDLINE abstracts; personal communication from Dr. Charles Berthold, NIDR)
Community Dentistry
The practice of dentistry concerned with preventive as well as diagnostic and treatment programs in a circumscribed population.
California
I'm sorry for any confusion, but "California" is a place, specifically a state on the western coast of the United States, and not a medical term or concept. Therefore, it doesn't have a medical definition.
Pediatric Dentistry
The practice of dentistry concerned with the dental problems of children, proper maintenance, and treatment. The dental care may include the services provided by dental specialists.
American Dental Association
Professional society representing the field of dentistry.
Data Collection
Systematic gathering of data for a particular purpose from various sources, including questionnaires, interviews, observation, existing records, and electronic devices. The process is usually preliminary to statistical analysis of the data.
Economic Competition
Questionnaires
Dental Implantation, Endosseous
Health Services Research
The integration of epidemiologic, sociological, economic, and other analytic sciences in the study of health services. Health services research is usually concerned with relationships between need, demand, supply, use, and outcome of health services. The aim of the research is evaluation, particularly in terms of structure, process, output, and outcome. (From Last, Dictionary of Epidemiology, 2d ed)
Blue Cross Blue Shield Insurance Plans
Prepaid health and hospital insurance plan.
Delivery of Health Care
The concept concerned with all aspects of providing and distributing health services to a patient population.
Legislation, Dental
Laws and regulations pertaining to the field of dentistry, proposed for enactment or recently enacted by a legislative body.
Employer Health Costs
That portion of total HEALTH CARE COSTS borne by an individual's or group's employing organization.
Cross-Sectional Studies
Incisor
Medical Indigency
Health Maintenance Organizations
Organized systems for providing comprehensive prepaid health care that have five basic attributes: (1) provide care in a defined geographic area; (2) provide or ensure delivery of an agreed-upon set of basic and supplemental health maintenance and treatment services; (3) provide care to a voluntarily enrolled group of persons; (4) require their enrollees to use the services of designated providers; and (5) receive reimbursement through a predetermined, fixed, periodic prepayment made by the enrollee without regard to the degree of services provided. (From Facts on File Dictionary of Health Care Management, 1988)
Costs and Cost Analysis
Ethnic Groups
Dental Enamel Hypoplasia
An acquired or hereditary condition due to deficiency in the formation of tooth enamel (AMELOGENESIS). It is usually characterized by defective, thin, or malformed DENTAL ENAMEL. Risk factors for enamel hypoplasia include gene mutations, nutritional deficiencies, diseases, and environmental factors.
Insurance, Surgical
A specific type of health insurance which provides surgeons' fees for specified amounts according to the type of surgery listed in the policy.
Privatization
Process of shifting publicly controlled services and/or facilities to the private sector.
Libraries, Dental
Managed Competition
A strategy for purchasing health care in a manner which will obtain maximum value for the price for the purchasers of the health care and the recipients. The concept was developed primarily by Alain Enthoven of Stanford University and promulgated by the Jackson Hole Group. The strategy depends on sponsors for groups of the population to be insured. The sponsor, in some cases a health alliance, acts as an intermediary between the group and competing provider groups (accountable health plans). The competition is price-based among annual premiums for a defined, standardized benefit package. (From Slee and Slee, Health Care Reform Terms, 1993)
Diagnosis, Oral
Fee-for-Service Plans
Method of charging whereby a physician or other practitioner bills for each encounter or service rendered. In addition to physicians, other health care professionals are reimbursed via this mechanism. Fee-for-service plans contrast with salary, per capita, and prepayment systems, where the payment does not change with the number of services actually used or if none are used. (From Discursive Dictionary of Health Care, 1976)
Evidence-Based Dentistry
An approach or process of practicing oral health care that requires the judicious integration of systematic assessments of clinical relevant scientific evidence, relating to the patient's oral and medical condition and history, with the dentist's clinical expertise and the patient's treatment needs and preferences. (from J Am Dent Assoc 134: 689, 2003)
Group Practice, Dental
Any group of three or more full-time dentists, organized in a legally recognized entity for the provision of dental care, sharing space, equipment, personnel and records for both patient care and business management, and who have a predetermined arrangement for the distribution of income.
Dental Pulp Diseases
Endodontic diseases of the DENTAL PULP inside the tooth, which is distinguished from PERIAPICAL DISEASES of the tissue surrounding the root.
Dental Prosthesis Design
The plan and delineation of dental prostheses in general or a specific dental prosthesis. It does not include DENTURE DESIGN. The framework usually consists of metal.
Medical Savings Accounts
Tooth Injuries
Dental Calculus
Policy Making
Dental Pulp Calcification
Tooth, Deciduous
The teeth of the first dentition, which are shed and replaced by the permanent teeth.
Social Welfare
Hispanic Americans
Persons living in the United States of Mexican (MEXICAN AMERICANS), Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South American, or other Spanish culture or origin. The concept does not include Brazilian Americans or Portuguese Americans.
Dentition
Dental Cavity Preparation
An operation in which carious material is removed from teeth and biomechanically correct forms are established in the teeth to receive and retain restorations. A constant requirement is provision for prevention of failure of the restoration through recurrence of decay or inadequate resistance to applied stresses. (Boucher's Clinical Dental Terminology, 4th ed, p239-40)
Dental Bonding
Dental Plaque Index
An index which scores the degree of dental plaque accumulation.
Health Status
Disabled Children
Toothbrushing
The act of cleaning teeth with a brush to remove plaque and prevent tooth decay. (From Webster, 3d ed)