Kingsport celebrates new state-of-the-art dental clinic

KINGSPORT, Tenn. (WJHL) – The City of Kingsport held a ribbon cutting Wednesday morning to celebrate the opening of a new dental clinic.

The new clinic is 6,000 square feet and includes 12 dental treatment rooms. The main goal of the clinic is to train dental students at both East Tennessee State University and the University of Tennessee.

“The ultimate goal of all this is to train dentists and hygienists and to hopefully deploy them back into the rural areas of East Tennessee,” City Manager Chris McCartt said.

McCartt told News Channel 11 that the clinic will benefit the area in three different ways: it will provide new jobs, higher education for students, and bring free dental treatment to those who can not afford it.

“It’s really important for those who do not have access to dental care, I really can’t stress that enough,” McCartt said. “There’s so many people in this region who can’t afford dental care, and travel two to three hours to find clinics such as what we’re looking at here.”

McCartt said dental treatment will be free for most patients but prices are set on a sliding scale based on income.

By having dental students come to Kingsport to train, city leaders hope they will decide to stay in the region and work full-time.

“The idea is if we could train folks from the region here, most likely they’ll stay back and increase the numbers of dentists in the area,” said James Ragain, dean emeritus for the University of Tennessee’s Health Science Center. “There are a lot of patients right now that are not being treated.”

Ragain said this is the first step to providing quality health care to the region.

“All the citizens of the state of Tennessee ought to have access to quality care,” McCartt said. “Unfortunately, Tennessee is ranked somewhere between 46 and 50 on access to care for its citizens and that’s pathetic.”

The clinic will begin operating and accepting patient applications this September.

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