Achieving Oral Health for All through Public Health Approaches, Interprofessional, and Transdisciplinary Education
Julian Fisher, Richard Berman, Kent Buse, Bruce Doll, Michael Glick, Jonathan M. Metzl, Riva Touger‐Decker
Abstract
Resolution on Oral Health, the World Health Organization's Global Strategy on Oral Health, and the draft Global Oral Health Action Plan 2023-2030, oral health is now recognized as an integral and primary component of the global health agenda (WHO, 2022a; WHO, 2022b).These documents have, for the first time, introduced a new and accepted definition for oral health that recognizes that the bio-medical model of oral health care-which focuses on health through a disease-centric and curative lens and excludes psychological, environmental, and social influences-is no longer sufficient for people to enjoy the highest state of oral health.The second strategic objective of the WHO's strategy speaks directly to this point, encouraging the enablement of all people to achieve the best possible oral health, and addressing social and commercial determinants as key risk factors for poor oral health.While there have undoubtedly been significant advances in oral health in the past two decades (NIH, 2021), these benefits have been more pronounced in certain groups and communities, and have been inequitably distributed across populations.The traditional curative model that has underpinned dentistry for the last century does not work for everyone, for a wide variety of reasons.A systematic analysis of the global burden of disease continues to show stubbornly high levels of unmet oral disease that impact the development, life opportunities, and daily lives of hundreds of millions of children and adults (Bernabe et al., 2020).Furthermore, these consequences of poor oral health do not take into account the additional millions of people impacted by the psycho-social burden of oral disease, which disproportionately affects older adults and people living in