HUTCHINSON, Kan. — PrairieStar Health Center is making a final push for community support this week as it hosts its “Smiles for Smiles” live clean comedy fundraiser Thursday night at the Hutchinson Fox Theatre.
The event, which begins at 6:30 p.m. Thursday, will feature nationally known comedian Rik Roberts of Nashville, Tennessee, with proceeds going toward PrairieStar’s effort to expand access to rural dental care through a new clinic planned just west of its current facility.
PrairieStar Marketing Director Kyran Losew said the event is designed to raise money for the dental expansion project while also giving the community a fun, family-friendly night out.
“Ticket sales will go towards our dental fundraiser,” Losew said. “But really, we just want to have a good time with the community.”
Doors open at 5:30 p.m. at the Fox Theatre, with tickets ranging from $25 to $40. Roberts, known for his clean comedy and family-friendly material, has appeared on DryBar Comedy, PureFlix Comedy All-Stars and SiriusXM radio. He also shares a Guinness World Record for the longest stand-up comedy show, which lasted more than seven days.
PrairieStar officials say the fundraiser supports the health center’s “Bridging the Gap in Access to Rural Dental Care” campaign, which aims to build a new, state-of-the-art dental clinic. The project is expected to break ground later this year and be completed next year.
Losew said the new building is expected to increase PrairieStar’s capacity by at least 2,000 patients annually, though she noted that still only begins to address the need in the region.
“It just barely touches the surface of the need,” Losew said.
PrairieStar, a nonprofit health center, provides medical, dental, vision and mental health services regardless of a patient’s ability to pay or insurance status. Losew said dental care remains one of the most pressing and underserved needs in south central Kansas and beyond.
“It affects everybody and anybody, and it affects your whole overall health,” Losew said. “It’s such an overlooked need that it gets so bad so quickly, and it’s underserved in our area.”
PrairieStar’s dental outreach program serves schools, nursing facilities and other community sites across a wide rural footprint, sometimes traveling as far as two hours from Hutchinson. Losew said the team focuses heavily on rural schools where students may otherwise go without a dental visit all year.
“These children may not get a dental visit at all in the year,” Losew said. “So this is their only cleaning and their only oral cancer check that they’ll get of the year.”
Even when families know services are available, Losew said barriers such as transportation, insurance limitations and lack of awareness about sliding fee options can keep patients from getting care.
“It’s hard to get into dental care,” Losew said. “It’s hard to find somewhere that will take your insurance. They don’t know that there’s places out there that have a sliding fee scale, or that they’ll see people without insurance.”
PrairieStar is working to unlock a $600,000 Mabee Foundation challenge grant for the project. Losew said the organization still needs to raise $676,000 by the end of the year to secure the matching funds.
She said the challenge grant adds urgency to fundraising efforts and makes community participation critical.
“It’s all about community engagement,” Losew said. “We need all the support from the community that we can get.”
Losew said even smaller donations can have a major impact.
“Even a little bit will help so many people,” she said. “Just $1,000 will help a couple thousand people a year.”
For PrairieStar, Thursday’s event is about more than a comedy show. It is also about building awareness of a growing regional need.
“This will help ensure that they are still able to get that care,” Losew said. “We’re really excited about this and to be able to expand this to more people.”