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Since Caring Hands Dental Clinic opened in Pipestone just over a year ago on June 6, 2022, it has provided over 5,117 appointments to over 1,940 patients of all ages from 10 counties in southwest Minnesota, according to Caring Hands CEO Al Olsen.
He said about 90 percent of those appointments were provided to patients who had state insurance programs for those with low incomes. The remaining 10 percent were for patients who paid cash or had private insurance.
Unlike many dental clinics, Caring Hands, an Alexandria-based 501c3 non-profit organization, provides dental care to people with the state insurance programs, primarily PrimeWest Health in this area. Many dentists don’t accept patients with those insurances because the programs pay dentists at a lower rate.
Caring Hands first started offering care to low-income people in the Pipestone area via a mobile dental clinic in 2014. Olsen then began his efforts to open a clinic in Pipestone in 2017, pursuing several options and even breaking ground at a different location before the clinic finally opened last year.
During the five-year process, Olsen said he wanted to open a clinic in Pipestone due to what he called a “dire need” for dental services for low-income residents in the Pipestone area. He said in 2017 that because of the limited access to dental care for low-income residents of southwest Minnesota, he expected that residents of surrounding counties would also utilize a Caring Hands Dental Clinic office in Pipestone.
One year after opening the Pipestone clinic, Olsen said the patient numbers are on par with what he expected with a clinic that size. He said the Pipestone clinic has 10 employees, including nine full-time and one part-time. That includes two dentists and one dental hygienist.
Olsen said human resources and retention have been challenges over the last year at both the Pipestone and Alexandria office. The Pipestone clinic has lost one of its two hygienists, for example, and will lose one of its two dentists in August.
Olsen said the clinics are sustaining, but that the staffing challenges did cause the nonprofit to delay an addition that Olsen hoped to make to the Pipestone clinic this year to create space for two more hygienists. Staffing issues have also led to scheduling delays with appointments being scheduled for three months out. Olsen said they prioritize children, existing patients and emergencies to get them in sooner. Staffing issues have also prevented Caring Hands from offering outreach services in Pipestone and Alexandria.
Caring Hands provides all general dentistry services that private practice dental clinics do. Olsen said Caring Hands has also connected with an oral surgeon in Sioux Falls to provide oral surgery services for PrimeWest patients.
“It was a good score,” Olsen said.
People are invited to come out and see the Pipestone clinic at 301 11th St. NE in Pipestone (behind Falls Landing) during an open house on July 13 from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.