Dental workforce shortage areas

Dental Health Professional Shortage Areas (Dental HPSAs) are areas designated by the Health Resources and Services Administration Bureau of Health Workforce (BHW) as having shortages of dentists.  The purpose of these designations is to identify areas of greatest need in order to prioritize limited resources.  The designation is primarily used for recruiting providers for the National Health Service Corp, J-1 Visa waivers and state loan forgiveness/repayment programs and grants.

There are three types of Dental HPSAs: geographic, population and facility.

  • Geographic -- indicate a lack of dentists accessible to an entire population in an area.
  • Population -- indicate a lack of dentists accessible to a specified population (i.e. people with low incomes) in an area.
  • Facility -- designations are based on population served and include comprehensive health centers, Federally Qualified Health Centers, rural health centers, correctional facilities, Indian Health Service or tribal health service or other public facility.

County Dental Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA) designations, 2018

 
Data source: Minnesota Department of Health, Office of Rural Health and Primary Care.
 
Data represent Dental Health Professional Areas designated by the Health Resources and Services Administration Bureau of Health Workforce as of January 2018. See About the Dental Health Professional Shortage Areas data for more information.

In January 2018, over half of Minnesota counties were designated as full county Dental HPSAs and 7 percent were designated as partial county Dental HPSAs.

County Map

Dental Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA) designations, 2018 Map

County map image health professional shortage areas and link to PDF of the same
 

Data represent Dental Health Professional Areas designated by the Health Resources and Services Administration Bureau of Health Workforce as of January 2018. See About the Dental Health Professional Shortage Areas data for more information.

 

Minnesota has a total of 124 Dental HPSAs. These include 9 geographic, 56 low-income population, 12 Indian Health Service and tribal health service and 47 other facility Dental HPSAs.