Guidelines for Health & Education and Research Fund Grant Applications

The Dental Health & Education Contribution supports programs that help develop and heighten dental awareness among the public as well as programs that improve health and increase access to professional dental care.

We carefully consider each request. Each application is reviewed by a screening committee to determine its general eligibility and conformity with the Fund's guidelines, the available funds, the amount needed to achieve the desired results, and program priority.

Dental Health & Education-Contribution Guidelines

1. Contributions are generally awarded for:
   1. Charitable programs designed to extend the benefits of dentistry to indigents and groups found to be dentally under-served.
   2. Educational programs to advance the awareness and/or the science of dentistry; and
   3. Programs designed to promote the public's dental health.
2. Delta Dental's Health, Education & Research Fund limits its commitments to a single year. Exceptions may be made when the initial request states that the contribution will be used over a period of years.
3. Contributions are only awarded to organizations within the enterprise and not to:
   1. Individuals
   2. Organizations that discriminate by race, religion, color, creed, sex, age, or national origin
   3. Political organizations or campaigns
   4. Loans

Download the application form (PDF)

Standard Dental Research Grant-Guidelines

The following guidelines have been established by the Delta Dental Health, Education & Research Fund for standard dental research grants:

1. Priority will go to projects that focus on issues related to the delivery of oral health care, including those with significant potential for improving oral health and reducing treatment costs.
2. Priority consideration will go to researchers from the dental schools in the enterprise, but will not be limited to these institutions.
3. Priority will go to two types of studies:
   1. Pilot or feasibility studies likely to enhance the investigator's chance for long-term funding from other sources.
   2. Complete projects considered to be of interest to the Health, Education & Research Fund, for which other sources of funds are traditionally not available or sufficient.
4. Priority will go to studies that evaluate the outcome of preventive and treatment procedures.
5. Retrospective studies or those involving analysis of existing data should be considered, rather than long-term follow-up studies, in order to reduce the years required to obtain data.
6. Overhead charges within each eligible grant will be limited to eight percent.
7. The Fund will normally make one to two standard research grants per year. Individual grants will generally not exceed $40,000.
8. Grants will be limited to one-year projects, subject to renewal. Except in special cases, an organization/entity will not be eligible for more than one grant during any year.

A screening committee reviews all applications, with final grant decisions made by the Fund's administrative committee.

Download the application form (PDF)