UIC College of Dentistry clinic celebrates milestone

The UIC College of Dentistry is excited to announce that the Illinois Children’s Healthcare Foundation Pediatric Dentistry Outpatient Care Center (ILCHF PD-OCC), which first opened its doors in 2020, has reached its goal of treating its 1,000th patient.

Driven by Illinois Children’s Healthcare Foundation’s (ILCHF) primary grant, the clinic’s other generous supporters include the Delta Dental of Illinois Foundation, the Delta Dental of Illinois Foundation’s Wisdom Tooth Award, the Coleman Foundation, Healthy Communities Foundation, Oak Park-River Forest Community Foundation, the Bisco Charitable Foundation, UIC Division of Specialized Care for Children, and a funding partner wishing to remain anonymous. With the help of these donors, ILCHF PD-OCC has been able to provide much needed dental care to children in need of dental support in the state of Illinois.

The ILCHF PD-OCC creates an opportunity to provide comprehensive oral health care in an efficient and timely manner. ILCHF was helpful in connecting the college to other private foundations that allowed the college to create this center, which fulfills an important part of the college’s mission and vision.

The ILCHF PD-OCC is located on the first floor of the college within a common shared suite with the oral and maxillofacial surgery department and has two general anesthesia suites that will continue to serve 1,000 children annually from 3 to 17 years of age who need oral health care under general anesthesia. The ILCHF PD-OCC project was initiated in response to the high volume of children who come to the pediatric dentistry clinics at the UIC College of Dentistry in need of general anesthesia, which often resulted in a lengthy waitlist of hundreds of children in need. The ILCHF PD-OCC enables the college to address the needs of those pediatric patients and their families, improving oral health and an overall quality of life.

The pediatric dentistry department at the UIC College of Dentistry is the largest provider of pediatric dental care in Illinois, serving almost 10,000 patients from birth to 17 years of age every year from across the state in 30,000 scheduled visits.