Arkansas has fewer dentists per capita than any other state except Alaska, according to a report on the nation’s health released recently by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
There were 41.7 active dentists for every 100,000 people in Arkansas in 2017. Alaska had 40.4 dentists.
Washington, D.C., had the most practicing dentists for its population, at a rate 103.9 for every 100,000 residents.
In the report, Arkansas also was one of just a few states that didn’t show a decline in community hospital beds between 2010 and 2016. (That should change in forthcoming reports, after this year’s closure of a hospital in De Queen.)
Nationwide, the number of community hospital beds per 1,000 people fell from 4.5 to 2.4 between 1980 and 2016, the analysis said.