Sarah Vander Beek
Sarah Vander Beek, DMD is the dental director for the Medicaid Dental Program at the Healthcare Authority. Prior to this, Sarah was the Chief Dental Officer at Neighborcare Health for 9 years. She began her dental career at Neighborcare Health as a staff dentist in 2019, after completing a General Practice Residency at the University of Washington. She graduated from the Arizona School of Dentistry and Oral Health in 2009, along with a Certificate in Public Health. Sarah has been involved in Quality Improvement initiatives with Dentaquest (Early Childhood Caries, Elimination of Dental Disease) and has also completed the Institute for Healthcare Improvement’s Open School. In addition to quality, Sarah has a passion for Safety and Infection Prevention and holds the OSAP/DALE Infection Prevention Certificate. She has also completed a year-long executive coaching program, and developing others has also been a focus of Sarah’s in her past leadership role.
She is passionate about social justice, equity, workforce development, the concept of the healthcare home and contributing to the evolving discussion of quality metrics in the field of dentistry. When she is not thinking about oral health, she can be found playing trucks with her sons, Robbie and Ryan, or adventuring in the outdoors skiing, hiking, or mountain biking.
Her oral health superpower is trying to make patient’s loads lighter. She thinks of it like taking a rock out of someone’s backpack- for some patients, it might be a tiny pebble and some it is a boulder- regardless, it is lighter! It’s an approach that helps her keep the humanity of her patients centered, acknowledging the heavy burdens (and barriers) they often endure.
