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Updated: Sep 19, 2025
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Oral Health Assessment by Lay Personnel for Older Adults
Published on: February 2, 2020
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Medicare Advantage Dental Benefits: Comprehensive Coverage Available In Fewer Than Half Of US Counties
Lisa Simon1, Marko Vujicic2, Kamyar Nasseh3
1Lisa Simon (lsimon@bwh.harvard.edu), Harvard University and Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts.
Health Affairs (Project Hope)
|June 2, 2025
Summary
Medicare Advantage plans offer dental coverage, but comprehensive options are scarce. In 2023, less than half of counties had access to a comprehensive dental plan, highlighting a gap in oral health benefits.
Area of Science:
- Health Services Research
- Public Health Policy
- Dental Insurance Access
Background:
- Traditional Medicare excludes dental coverage, despite oral health's link to overall well-being.
- Medicare Advantage (MA) plans can offer dental as a supplemental benefit.
- Limited data exists on the geographic availability of MA dental coverage.
Purpose of the Study:
- To examine the availability of dental coverage within Medicare Advantage plans by county in 2023.
- To identify characteristics associated with the availability of MA dental benefits.
- To inform policy regarding dental coverage in Medicare Advantage.
Main Methods:
- Analysis of public data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services on MA supplemental benefits.
- Examined dental benefit availability at the county level for 2023.
- Utilized Poisson regression to assess associations between county characteristics and dental benefit availability.
Main Results:
- Beneficiaries had access to an average of 34.9 MA plans with some dental benefit, but only 1.7 with comprehensive dental coverage.
- Nationally, 39.9% of counties offered at least one comprehensive dental plan.
- Larger populations, higher MA market penetration, and lower insurer concentration were associated with greater dental benefit availability.
Conclusions:
- Comprehensive dental coverage is limited in Medicare Advantage plans, with significant geographic disparities.
- Factors like population size and market competition influence dental benefit availability.
- Policy considerations should include quality benchmarks for MA dental plans and their role in enrollment incentives.
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