Treat Me Tender - Engaging Community in Oral Health Policy
Presented by Kaylan Szafranski, MS, MSW
Health Policy Director - NC Child
Course Description: During this session attendees will walk through recent efforts in North Carolina to meaningfully engage community members, particularly individuals and families on Medicaid, in issue identification and policy based solution development within the state’s Medicaid Oral Health benefit. This presentation will touch on the importance of collaborating directly with communities when creating oral health policy, best practices for engagement, and many lessons learned along the way. Additionally, we will discuss how to help create sustainable spaces for communities to continue their advocacy alongside traditional decision makers.
Learning Objectives:
- Community Engagement Practices
- Understanding community driven policy development
- Developing sustainable cross system collaboration
Kaylan Szafranski, MSW, MS
Kaylan Szafranski is the Health Policy Director for NC Child and leads the organization's Medicaid and oral health policy agenda. Prior to her role at NC Child, Kaylan championed children’s health in Illinois, serving as the head policy analyst for Legal Council for Health Justice. In this role she led statewide efforts on children’s Medicaid policy including access to EPSDT, infant and early childhood mental health, environmental health reforms, and expanding eligibility and services for infants and pregnant persons. Kaylan also served as the Manager of Health Reform for EverThrive Illinois, focusing on maternal and child health policy at both the state and federal levels. In addition to her deep knowledge of Medicaid policy, Kaylan is a former early child educator and Developmental Therapist, spending nearly 7 years serving families in her hometown of Greensboro, NC. She holds her Masters of Social Work and Masters of Child Development from Erikson Institute.
This speaker has declared no commercial conflict of interest relative to this presentation.