California - Dientes Community Dental Care - AEGD

Health Center Contact:
Dientes Community Dental
Sepi Taghvaei, DDS
Chief Dental Officer/AEGD Program Director
Staghvaei@dientes.org

Name of Training Site:
Dientes Community Dental Care

What is the mission of your training site?
Dientes is on a mission to create lasting oral health for the low-income children, adults, and seniors of Santa Cruz County and neighboring communities so that everyone has the dignity that comes from a healthy smile.

What types of dental services can I expect to perform?

• Diagnosis and treatment planning
• Restorative Dentistry
• Oral surgery
• Fixed and removable prosthodontics
• Endodontics
• Pediatric Dentistry
• We have two pediatric dentists, an endodontist, and an oral surgeon on our staff

What types of technologies can I expect to use?

• Electronic health records (Dentrix)
• Digital Radiography
• Cone beam CT
• Endoscope

What is the patient population?

Our patients are some of the most vulnerable people in our community. 97% of our patients live at or below the federal poverty level. Our patients include publicly insured and uninsured adults, seniors, children, patients who are homeless, patients with HIV/AIDs, patients with physical or mental disabilities, farmworkers and their families and others who lack access to care. Approximately 10% are homeless and 13% are uninsured. Dientes is a multi-lingual, multi-cultural clinic, over 30% of our patients speak Spanish. 47% of our patients are kids age 0-20, 13% are seniors age 65+, and the remaining 40% are adults (21-64). 35% of our patients are Latinx; 45% are Caucasian; 2% are Asian; 1% are African American and 17% are multiracial or other. Half of our patients are female, and half are male.

What is life like outside of the training site?
Santa Cruz County is an amazing place for nature-lovers. You’ll find beautiful beaches, great surf, and redwood-covered mountains all within a few miles of each other.  You can spend your days lounging by the beach, hiking the many beautiful trails, enjoying places for world-class mountain biking and cycling, whale watching, attending organic farmers’ markets, enjoying the burgeoning beer and wine scene, and listening to live music.

Will residents have the opportunity to restore and/or place implants at your training site?
Although we do not place or restore implants currently, we hope to be able to offer training to the residents by partnering with local private practitioners.

Will residents treat children in your training site?
Yes!  47% of our patients are children.  We have two pediatric dentists at Dientes and they will be mentoring and guiding the residents with pediatric treatment and prevention modalities.