.bodytext {float: left; } .floatimg-left-hort { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right: 10px; width:300px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-caption-hort { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:300px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatimg-left-vert { float:left; margin-top:10px; margin-right:15px; width:200px;} .floatimg-left-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; font-size: 10px; width:200px;} .floatimg-right-hort { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px;} .floatimg-right-caption-hort { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 300px; font-size: 10px; } .floatimg-right-vert { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px;} .floatimg-right-caption-vert { float:left; margin-right:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; font-size: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 200px; border-top-style: double; border-top-color: black; border-bottom-style: double; border-bottom-color: black;} .floatimgright-sidebar p { line-height: 115%; text-indent: 10px; } .floatimgright-sidebar h4 { font-variant:small-caps; } .pullquote { float:right; margin-top:10px; margin-left:10px; margin-bottom:10px; width: 150px; background: url(http://www.dmbusinessdaily.com/DAILY/editorial/extras/closequote.gif) no-repeat bottom right !important ; line-height: 150%; font-size: 125%; border-top: 1px solid; border-bottom: 1px solid;} .floatvidleft { float:left; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} .floatvidright { float:right; margin-bottom:10px; width:325px; margin-right:10px; clear:left;} Iowa employers have more options than ever for offering dental coverage to their employees. But because of the costs, small businesses are still the least likely to offer dental benefits.

There are efforts by insurers to fill the coverage cavity, however.

Iowa’s largest provider of dental insurance, Delta Dental Plan of Iowa, announced earlier this year that it would begin offering individual and family coverage for those who aren’t covered by company group dental plans. Another major dental carrier, Principal Financial Group Inc., came out with a group plan this year that allows individual employees to choose from a menu of benefits.

Principal rolled out Principal Dental Series II on Oct. 1 in 38 states, including Iowa. In the first week of sales, the insurer sold the plan to more than 100 companies of various sizes, said Theresa McConeghy, Principal’s dental product director.

“Feedback from brokers and our sales reps has been overwhelmingly positive,” she said.

Overall, the number of U.S. employers offering dental coverage has increased slightly, “which we’re thrilled with,” she said. An estimated 159 million Americans have dental insurance coverage.

“There has been quite a bit of work done on the part of carriers to educate people about the connection between oral health and overall health, and I think that’s helping customers to see the value in it,” McConeghy said. “We actually did a road show on that topic and visited brokers.”

According to the 2007 Iowa Employer Benefits Study conducted by David P. Lind & Associates in Clive, 68 percent of employers in the state surveyed offered dental benefits. Companies with 1,000 or more employees were much more likely to offer the coverage than smaller businesses, however. Among companies with between 10 and 19 employees, just 26 percent offered dental coverage, compared with nearly 91 percent of companies with 1,000 or more employees.

Kabel Business Services, a third-party administrator for flexible spending and health reimbursement accounts in West Des Moines, chose to provide its employees with a set amount of benefit dollars each month through a cafeteria-style plan, which includes dental insurance as one of the options.

“We could dictate: Here’s what’s available; take it or leave it,” said Gary Bishop, vice president and co-owner of Kabel, “but being in the business, we know that it makes more sense to give them the choice, because everyone’s needs are different.” Such an arrangement also allows that benefit to be provided on a pre-tax basis to employees, he said.

Many small companies choose a health reimbursement arrangement in which they designate a maximum amount they will reimburse each employee per year for dental expenses, Bishop said. An advantage for employers is that a third-party administrator such as Kabel can handle the disbursements and record-keeping.

In many cases, owners of small companies know their employees well and have a good sense for what most would want in coverage, Bishop said. Others prefer to let the employees decide themselves. “Every employer is different, and their needs are different,” he said.

According to the Lind survey, 52 percent of Iowa employers that provided dental coverage offered fully insured dental plans, while 48 percent were self-insured.

Participants in Principal’s new dental plan have a lifetime deductible feature, meaning they have to meet just one deductible amount throughout their lifetime of coverage with Principal. They can also add benefit riders for coverage of services not always included in a traditional plan, including dental implants, temporomandibular treatment, cosmetic services, dental accidents and orthodontia. Employees may also roll over a portion of their unused annual maximum accumulation benefit to the following year.

Delta Dental, whose network includes approximately 90 percent of Iowa dentists, says its new individual benefit plan design is also rich with choices.

“We designed these benefits to give people a choice depending on their particular needs,” said Greg Shireman, the company’s vice president for marketing and sales.

Those options include a low-premium preventive plan that covers routine services such as checkups, cleanings and fillings; a catastrophic plan that covers only major services, such as root canals, bridges and crowns; or comprehensive, which combines the benefits of the preventive and catastrophic plans.