How severe is the dentist shortage?

There are a total of 4,878 dental care Health Professional Shortage Areas, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Advertisement

Dental HPSAs are defined as a population ratio of one dentist to 5,000 or more people. To eliminate the nearly 5,000 dental HPSAs in the country it would take an estimated 7,300 additional dentists, according to HHS.

Here 30 statistics on the 10 states with the most dental HPSAs.

California
•    HPSAs: 341
•    Percent of need met: 41.25 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 193

Texas
•    HPSAs: 240
•    Percent of need met: 63.72 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 349

Florida
•    HPSAs: 220
•    Percent of need met: 17.25 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 860

Michigan
•    HPSAs: 212
•    Percent of need met: 41.79 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 128

Arizona
•    HPSAs: 170
•    Percent of need met: 31.65 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 431

Illinois
•    HPSAs: 161
•    Percent of need met: 30.83 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 401

Missouri
•    HPSAs: 160
•    Percent of need met: 24.51 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 286

Pennsylvania
•    HPSAs: 160
•    Percent of need met: 40.26 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 302

Georgia
•    HPSAs: 148
•    Percent of need met: 27.05 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 280

Tennessee
•    HPSAs: 140
•    Percent of need met: 25.79 percent
•    Dentists needed to remove HSPA designation: 353

More articles on dental issues:
Aspen Dental opens new Tennessee location
California Governor signs dental spending disclosure bill
9 statistics on oral health habits in the United States

Advertisement

Next Up in Uncategorized

  • Texas, Florida and Connecticut have seen the most DSO activity during the fourth quarter of 2025. Becker’s compiled a list…

  • Here are 11 key DSO updates from December: 1. Southlake, Texas-based Allied OMS added its first New Jersey practice. 2.…

  • Here are four recent updates on dental company CFOs: 1. Matthew Garth stepped down from his role as executive vice…

Advertisement

Comments are closed.