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Seniors’ Oral Health
Emerges as Priority Issue
at CDA Board Meeting
The CDA Board of Directors held a planning session during its June
meeting in St. Andrews-by-the-Sea, New Brunswick, to set short- and
long-term directives for the Association. The newly identified strategic
priorities can be summed up as “Strong Profession, United Community,
Healthy Public.” Under this banner, the Board identified a streamlined list
of CDA priorities and actions, and singled out issues that will take preced-
ence during the future allocation of resources.
A significant outcome of the meeting was identifying access to care for seniors as the key government relations issue
for the coming year. As such, the Board directed CDA staff to facilitate coordinated action with corporate members and
stakeholders on this issue.
Seniors’ oral health was front and centre at the meeting as the Board accepted the Report on Seniors’ Oral
Health Care — a document prepared by CDA’s Seniors’ Task Force under the guidance of the Committee on Clinical
and Scientific Affairs. The Board noted the comprehensiveness and quality of the report and pledged to prioritize its
recommendations.
Among other noteworthy agenda items, the Board received the final report of the Relationships and Communications
project team — one of the special project teams created by CDA in August 2007. The team’s report outlined 6 key rec-
ommendations, including establishing protocols to maximize the efficiency and effectiveness of CDA’s communications
efforts, both internally and externally. This will occur under the direction of Mr. Claude Paul Boivin, the new CDA execu-
tive director. The Board asked that one additional recommendation be added to the list, that of regularly monitoring
relationships and communications in the future. a
CDA Public Education Program Update: Summer Oral Health Insert
CDA, in collaboration with the provincial dental associations, produced a
9-page oral health insert in the summer issue of Canadian Health and Lifestyle
magazine. Featuring interviews with CDA president Dr. Deborah Stymiest, as
well as Dr. Joel Antel, chair of the Communications Committee of the Manitoba
Dental Association, Dr. Alastair Nicoll, president of the British Columbia Dental
Association, and Dr. Larry Levin, president of the Ontario Dental Association,
the insert focused on oral cancer, dental anxiety, the risks of oral jewelry, and
the cause and prevention of tooth decay and dental erosion.
Canadian Health and Lifestyle is a quarterly publication circulated across
Canada to all Rexall pharmacies and high-volume health practitioner waiting
rooms, including dentists and physicians, and has a readership of more than
2 million.
The ongoing key messages of CDA’s Public Education Program (PEP) are
the promotion of the primacy and role of the dentist, the value of regular
dental care, the importance of a healthy mouth for a healthy body, and the
value of the CDA Seal of Recognition. Key messages on oral cancer have also
been developed for 2008 and are being communicated to Canadians through
various year-round campaigns, including National Oral Health Month. TM
The oral health insert can be viewed
online at: www.healthandlifestyle.ca/
Health/Dental/Oral_Health.aspx
CDA’s PEP is also continuing the expansion of the Patient Information Brochures series to include 8 more titles
scheduled for release by the end of the year. a
JCDA • www.cda-adc.ca/jcda • September 2008, Vol. 74, No. 7 • 579