Delta Dental

Delta Dental is the largest and oldest dental plan system in the United States. The Delta Dental Plans Association is comprised of 39 independent Delta Dental member companies operating in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. These member companies provide coverage to 46 million people, enrolled in over 80,000 groups. While many of the Delta Dental member companies and the Delta Dental Plans Association (DDPA) are non-profit organizations, a few of the member companies have for-profit segments.

Delta Dental member companies serve over one-quarter of the estimated 159 million Americans with dental insurance.

Who is my insurer?
If you have your insurance through your employer, look for Delta Dental in the state of their headquarters. So if you work for Widget Inc, and their headquarters are in Kansas, contact Delta Dental of Kansas. The private insurance options are held by Delta Dental of California, the retired military is handled by Tri-Care, and the AARP plan has their own hot line as well. While a little confusing at first, this structure grew out of the history of Delta Dental.

History
Delta Dental's roots go back to 1954 with the formation of dental service corporations in California, Oregon and Washington, which were created by dentists who recognized the need to increase access to oral health care. Led by Washington Dental Service (WDS), Delta Dental began by providing dental benefit programs for organized labor unions.

Delta Dental Plans Association (DDPA) was created in 1966 to bring together these local state service organizations and coordinate dental benefit programs for customers with employees in multiple states. A year later, the first multi-state program was sold by WDS to the International Association of Machinists. WDS ceded the administration for enrollees in other states to other Delta Dental member companies and contracted with the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association for administration in those states without a Delta Dental affiliate organization.

Coverage was provided this way until the late 1980s when the Delta Dental of California (DDCA) won the bid for the Office of the Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services (OCHAMPUS) program. Delta Dental member companies agreed to share its provider data so the administration of this very large account could be centralized, with Delta Dental of California sharing the administrative income and risk. The OCHAMPUS program led to the creation of the National Provider File (NPF), which was made available for commercial accounts in 1990 via Delta USA – providing Delta Dental coverage to organizations with employees and subscribers located in multiple states.

Current structure
Delta Dental's mandate is to increase the future definition of dental benefits to improve access to dental care. We do this by encouraging the expansion of dental benefit programs administered through our 39 member companies. Delta Dental provides the means for these service corporations to cooperate in the provision of multi-state and national group dental coverage.

The headquarters of a company dictates which Delta Dental member company will provide insurance for that company. While there are only 39 member companies, every state is covered by a member company now. For instance, one of the larger member companies, Delta Dental Insurance Company (DDIC), provides coverage for Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, Texas, and Utah. DDIC is also affiliated with Delta Dental of California, giving them a total coverage area of 16 states and the District of Columbia. The size of a member company varies a great deal, with the largest in the thousands of employees, down to the smallest with tens of employees.

While the member companies are individual and very independent companies, there is an association they all belong to called Delta Dental Plans Association (DDPA). This association is more like a trade association rather than a corporate headquarters. DDPA is a very small company of about 30 people out of Oak Brook, IL, not to be confused with Delta Dental of Illinois, which has 120+ people and is based in Lisle, IL. DDPA manages the Delta Dental brand, helps organize meetings, ties all the member companies together, and allows them to price claims in other states. The National Provider File (NPF) allows these localized companies to write national business. This allows a subscriber to go to any provider signed up with the Delta Dental system throughout the country.