Oral and Dental Health in Indonesia

Oral and dental disease is one of the most common health problems in Indonesia, yet most of it never reaches formal care. The 2018 Riskesdas survey found that 57.6 percent of the population reported a dental problem, while only 10.2 percent received care from a dental professional. This report looks at oral and dental health from two angles: how people actually use the National Health Insurance scheme (JKN) for dental care, and whether the health system has the workforce and facilities to deliver that care.

Both analyses draw on national data. The demand side uses the BPJS Kesehatan Sample Data for 2015 to 2024 and counts dental visits coded under ICD-10 K00 to K14. The supply side combines the national health workforce registry, the hospital information system, and population projections for 2025. Together they show a service that is concentrated at the primary level, arrives relatively late, and is delivered by a workforce that is heavily clustered in cities and on Java.

Key findings

• About 32.6 million people were served for an oral or dental condition through JKN, drawn from roughly 380,700 unique dental patients in the sample. Care is overwhelmingly primary: 83 percent of patients were seen only at primary facilities, and 15 percent used both primary and hospital care.
• When dental care does reach hospitals it is often already advanced, and hospital dental spending rose steadily from about Rp 0.20 trillion in 2015 to about Rp 2.29 trillion in 2024, reflecting both growing access and later presentation.
• The dental workforce is thin and uneven: 12.87 general dentists per 100,000 people nationally, below the WHO reference of about 13.30, with city density at 32.30 per 100,000 versus 7.60 in regencies, a gap of roughly 4.3 times.
• Dental care is heavily concentrated on Java, which holds 59.1 percent of dentists, and 208 regencies fall below half of the WHO reference, with a workforce concentration (Gini) of 0.69.
• Dental specialists are very rare: oral and maxillofacial surgery sits at 0.23 per 100,000, and 63.2 percent of regencies have none, while only 5.1 percent of hospitals offer a full set of dental services and 12.1 percent of districts have no hospital dental service at all.

Choose an analysis

The two reports answer different questions. Read whichever fits your need, or read both for the full picture.