The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA), US Department of Health and Human Services provides open source health data through its Data Warehouse integrating with external sources such as the US Census Bureau providing information about health centers and other public health programs &servicess. HRSA’s mission is to improve health and achieve health equity through access to quality services, a skilled health workforce, and innovative programs.
The above map from HRSA provides an overview of the county-wise dental healthcare professionals shortage area. It is highly recommended to review the federal criteria for shortage area designation. Few noticeable things from the map are:
- Rural US visually has high dental professionals shortage area.
- Northeastern states have a better dental professional distribution that the states of the Midwest.
- Nebraska has most of its state as non-HPSA regions.