The NYU Oral Health Center for People with Disabilities will provide an important alternative for a large and vulnerable segment of our population, whose only option for oral healthcare, in many cases, is limited to a hospital operating room (routinely after a six-month wait).

The Center will feature two fully equipped sedation suites, thus reducing the need for hospital referrals and providing a dental home for people with disabilities on an ongoing basis in a way that a transient admission to a general hospital could never hope to offer. Continuity of care is essential, since current care involving hospitalization may be followed by a protracted period of dental neglect, which can result in re-hospitalization within 18–24 months.

We can do better; we must do better. NYU College of Dentistry, the nation’s largest academic dental center, is uniquely positioned to address this pressing public health need. Within the new facility, the full scope of oral healthcare needs will be met for patients with physical, cognitive, acquired, and developmental disabilities. Operatories that have been specially designed to accommodate wheelchairs will enable us to provide oral healthcare across the patient’s life span. Importantly, the Center will educate a new generation of dentists who will be competent to provide quality care for these patients, while also educating them — and their caregivers — on maintaining oral health.

With your support, NYU College of Dentistry will lead the way by making the Center a reality, improving the lives of these patients, and advancing the profession.