Thirteen percent of families living in Chautauqua County live in poverty. Despite this, not one pediatric dentist in the county accepts Medicaid.

The reason is simple: money.

Medicaid reimburses dentists at a much lower rate than private insurers, and most private practices have decided that dealing with the red tape isn’t worth their time.

Access to such care has plagued much of rural New York State, but since 1997, the dental school at the University at Buffalo has tried to solve this problem in Chautauqua County with its Mobile Dental Unit.

It’s exactly what it sounds like: two dental chairs in a Winnebagotype mobile home staffed by three dentists and a team of assistants, who take a huge pay cut one or two days a week to help fight tooth decay in rural areas.

The van visits schools and community centers throughout the Southern Tier county, from Jamestown to Dunkirk to Ripley, screening and treating children for cavities and

other minor dental problems. The University of Rochester Medical Center runs a similar program, with a presence in Batavia.

“There’s a lack of dental knowledge among the population, especially in the rural core,” said Jim Harris, who helps organize the program for UB. “They don’t really get the importance of regular visits. Some of these families have, like, one toothbrush in the family, in the most extreme cases.”

Without regular checkups, these kids “are often taken to the emergency room because of how bad [the pain] gets,” Harris said, leading to missed school and higher health care costs.

While the van in Jamestown has all the cutesy doodads of any childhood dental office — like decals of Scooby Doo and stickers of Dora the Explorer — its equipment has started to age.

Lately, much money and time has been put into maintaining the van, and for much of the past few months, UB had been seeking outside funding to purchase a new vehicle, knowing that if it failed to do so, it would have to shut the van in the next two years.

It succeeded. Last week, a $500,000 federal grant was awarded to the university, and those involved couldn’t be happier.

“The nice thing about getting the new van is that it will cause our duct tape budget to go way down,” joked Dr. Mike Phillips, a UB dentist working at the van Thursday.

It’s a win for the patients, too, many of whom struggled to find reasonably priced dental care. Susan Swan started taking her two grandchildren there for just that reason. Her granddaughter, who is 7, struggled with dental problems, until she went to the van to see Phillips, or “Dr. Mike” as he is referred to by staff and young patients.

“This little girl couldn’t eat an apple, have corn on the cob. Everybody was making fun of her, her friends, because her teeth were just so bad,” Swan said. “And now, the other day, she was talking about ‘Dr. Mike,’ and she said, ‘Dr. Mike is wonderful. He’s really the best. He works magic.’ ”

UB’s current van will remain in Jamestown through the summer at the Joint Neighborhood Project, 532 E. Second St. Harris said it will be at least a year before the new van is purchased, but that it will be state-of-the-art and allow them to see more patients and perform more procedures.

kbargnes@buffnews.comnull