MHREF secures second grant for pilot program integrating oral health into hospital care teams
As a longtime dental hygienist, Melissa Kjos-Peterson is no stranger to healthcare and caring for patients. Her passion for oral health education recently led her to brand-new territory inside the halls of Logan Health – Whitefish.
Kjos-Peterson is the Oral Health Educator at the hospital, a new position supported by a grant to pilot and expand a new model for integrating oral health into hospital-based care.
“This is the first project of its kind in Montana,” she said. “When you think of hospitals, you don’t usually think about your mouth, but oral health is closely connected to overall health.”
Montana Health Education and Research Foundation (MHREF), housed inside the Montana Hospital Association, launched the program in 2026 through a partnership with CareQuest Institute for Oral Health. The goal is to bring expertise of a dental hygienist into a hospital setting, making it a more intentional part of comprehensive, person-centered care.
The first grant project, Bridging the Gap: Integrating Dental Hygiene into Montana’s Hospital Care Teams, established the pilot, which included recruiting Kjos-Peterson and securing Logan Health – Whitefish as the pilot site. In June, MHREF received notification of the second award – Bridging the Gap II: Expanding Oral Health Integration in Montana Hospitals – that will allow Kjos-Peterson to continue and likely expand her work with Logan Health through July 2027.
Much of her work so far has focused on gathering information to understand how specific departments can use an oral health educator.
“I hear the staff say they understand that the mouth needs to be healthy; that it’s connected to the rest of the body. But that care is often addressed separately. Where I come in is to share the education, guidance, and resources to help support patient oral health,” she said.
She’s spent time with numerous hospital departments sharing education on the connection between oral health and infection prevention. For example, a cleaner mouth can help lower the risk of pneumonia, she said. For Obstetrics and Pediatrics, Kjos-Peterson developed patient education pieces highlighting the importance of and key steps to maintain good oral health for pregnant women and newborns.
She’s also created a resource list to help care coordinators find appointments with area dentists for patients with urgent needs.
Logan Health – Whitefish’s participation was crucial to establishing the pilot, said Katie Glueckert, Director of MHREF’s South Central Montana Area Health Education Center. She is the CareQuest Institute project director and a registered dental hygienist.
“We’re lucky to have partners like Logan Health – Whitefish that want to dive in and help advance healthcare workforce innovations like this,” Glueckert said.
After six months of work the program focus is expanding. Kjos-Peterson is now part of the Logan Health’s Education Department under the Manager of Clinical Education, which means she could eventually support additional hospitals in the system.
Along with expansion, Glueckert said other areas of focus for the program include evaluating the model, understanding its sustainability and sharing what is learned with oral health and healthcare workforce partners across Montana.
“We’ve just started to set the stage for why this is important,” Kjos-Peterson said.