The Childsmile Community and Practice Programme is designed to address oral health inequalities, through embedding support workers within the more disadvantaged communities and offering oral health support to families with young children, in the family home.
Childsmile works closely with health visitors, dental teams, Education, community groups and other partners.
Childsmile works with the local community to map services that can support families from a range of areas including:
- food banks
- welfare
- parent/baby groups
- nutrition
- community family support (e.g. Homestart)
- additional support needs
- dedicated ethnic minority services
- and many more.
Tooth decay is preventable
If Childsmile can support families to remove barriers that prevent daily, routine, toothbushing; this can reduce the need to see a dentist.
Our Dental Health Support Workers (DHSW) will:
- use a person-centered, empathic method to support families living in disadvantaged areas to understand the everyday barriers and facilitators to adopting child, oral-health promoting behaviours
- develop tailored practical ideas for parents to support behaviour change
- provide the central link between dental services, the family and the health visitor
- give additional oral health support to children and families most in need
Additional support will be given to children and families most in need through home visits, community initiatives and primary care dental services.