ReachOut Healthcare America
ReachOut Healthcare America (RHA) is an American company that manages dental clinics. Its headquarters are in Phoenix, Arizona.[1] Under the name "Big Smiles,"[2] it coordinates dentist vans that go to American schools and do dental checkups and dental work on poor children.[3]
History
[change | change source]Michael Howell and Daniel Goldsmith started the ReachOut company in 1997. At first the company managed dental checkups and dental work for people in nursing homes in Michigan. The company later began organizing dental care for schools, foster programs, group homes, homeless shelters, and mental health facilities by late 2003.[4]
In October 2011, boy in a Camp Verde, Arizona had dental work done by a dentist linked with ReachOut. The boy said it hurt. His mother, Stacey Gagnon, said that the dentist did dental work on the boy without asking the parents if it was okay.[4] Darren and Stacey Gagnon, the parents of the boy, sued the dentist and the Reachout company.[5] In November 2011, Dan Brown, then the superintendent of the Camp Verde Unified School District, signed a letter saying that ReachOut cannot go to the district's schools anymore.[5]
ReachOut used to send dentists to schools in the Clark County School District,[4] the biggest school district in the state of Nevada. In December 2011 the district stopped working with ReachOut.
Ken Tucker, a reporter for the newspaper Arizona Republic, wrote that ReachOut did not give good care after the dental work was done because the dentists only came to the school twice a year.[2] A mobile dentist who worked with ReachOut, Derryl Brian, said that the dentists under ReachOut had, since 2006, done screenings and work on 80,000 children. Brian said that a lot of people liked what they did.[4]
Related pages
[change | change source]Sources
[change | change source]- ↑ "Contact Us Archived 2013-01-17 at the Wayback Machine." ReachOut Healthcare America. Rerieved on September 12, 2012. "We've moved: 2550 W. Union Hills Dr. Ste. 202 Phoenix, AZ 85027" and "ReachOut Healthcare America 1904 W. Parkside Ln, Suite 201 Phoenix, AZ 85027"
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Dental Teachers "[./Dental Teachers And Dental Simulation Units Dental Teachers And Dental Simulation Units
- ↑ "School Programs Archived 2013-01-17 at the Wayback Machine." ReachOut Healthcare America. Retrieved on September 12, 2012.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Freedberg, Sydney P. "Dental Abuse Seen Driven by Private Equity Investments." Bloomberg. May 17, 2012. Retrieved on September 12, 2012.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 "INSIDE EDITION Investigates Mobile Dentistry." Inside Edition. September 11, 2012. Retrieved on September 12, 2012.
Other websites
[change | change source]- ReachOut Healthcare America Archived 2013-01-17 at the Wayback Machine
- Big Smiles Dental (Alternate link[permanent dead link]) - operated by ReachOut
- Reach Out Healthcare America Archived 2013-01-28 at the Wayback Machine." Moriarty Leyendecker (law company that is suing ReachOut)
- Collins, Katie. "Big Smiles dentists visits Thomson Primary School." Brush News-Tribune. April 17, 2012.