Dental care risk management provided by Social Protection Institutions of Senegal

Abstract

Nowadays in Senegal, located in West Africa, social protection institutions are confronted with a substantially increased healthcare expenditure in general, and oral care in particular. The ability of the leadership to use techniques to contain the impact of risks they are facing determine their viability. The aim of our study was to analyze the risk management of dental care coverage by those institutions. The study was descriptive, extensive and focused on all active social protection Institutions in Senegal since 2005, at least. Our results showed that, in spite of the implementation of risk management mechanisms such as patient co-payment (97% of institutions), coverage ceiling (26%) and dentist council (15%), healthcare expenditure still growing. For the containment of oral care expenditure increase, it is important to raise awareness among social protection institutions for a greater use of existing risk management mechanisms.