Dental Hygiene to Prevent Disease Among Wampanoag

Massachusetts’s summer resorts in Cape Cod and Martha’s Vineyard offer miles of sand and sea, and they are not among the areas of the country that one would think have a dental disparity problem. The Wampanoag Native Americans who are based on the Cape and Vineyard, however, experience a lack of preventive and low-cost restorative care.

Mary L. Kellerman, RDH, MS-DPH, along with volunteers from the Harvard Dental School, are attempting to alleviate this disparity. Many studies have demonstrated the lack of care for a variety of children’s groups, but little has been researched about adult populations, particularly Native American adults.