Summary:
Henry Schein Inc. is donating essential healthcare products to support the Special Olympics Healthy Athletes screenings at the 2025 World Winter Games in Turin, Italy, continuing its long-standing partnership to improve healthcare access for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD).
Key Takeaways:
- Ongoing Support: Henry Schein has supported Special Olympics Healthy Athletes since 2018, donating medical and dental supplies to multiple countries.
- Comprehensive Health Screenings: The donations will support seven healthcare disciplines, including audiology, dentistry, vision care, and mental health.
- Lasting Impact: The initiative not only provides free screenings but also trains healthcare professionals to better serve individuals with IDD beyond Special Olympics events.
Henry Schein Inc.—a provider of healthcare solutions to office-based medical and dental practitioners—is supporting the Special Olympics Healthy Athletes screenings at the Special Olympics World Winter Games Turin 2025, which take place from March 8 to 15, 2025, in Turin, Italy. The organization is donating a range of oral health and medical products essential to overall health and wellness. During the Healthy Athletes Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, on March 8, 2025, Henry Schein was recognized for these contributions.
Healthy Athletes offers free health screenings and education to participating Special Olympics athletes. The goal of the program is to identify and address unmet health needs for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) and provide referrals for follow-up care while also promoting healthy lifestyle choices.
As a partner since 2018, Henry Schein has donated essential healthcare products to support local programs in Canada, Germany, Israel, Jamaica, the United Kingdom, the United States, and now Italy. Most recently, in support of the Special Olympics World Games in Berlin in June of 2023, the organization provided $55,000 in medical and non-medical supplies to support the administration of the Games.
“Over the past seven years, our partnership with Henry Schein has been pivotal in enabling us to deliver free high-quality health screenings for our athletes,” shares Dimitri Christakis, MD, MPH, chief health officer at Special Olympics. “We are grateful for the organization’s ongoing support in Turin, which enables us to provide accessible and dignified healthcare that everyone deserves.”
Henry Schein’s donations will be used during the Special Olympic World Winter Games for screenings in seven Healthy Athletes disciplines, including Healthy Hearing (audiology), Special Smiles (dentistry), Fit Feet (podiatry), FUNFitness (physiotherapy), Health Promotion (preventive medicine), Special Olympics Lions Clubs International Foundation Opening Eyes (vision care), and Strong Minds (mental health).
“At Henry Schein, we are strongly committed to ‘help health happen’ and to create shared value for society,” said Jennifer Kim Field, chief sustainability officer at Henry Schein. “We are honored to support Healthy Athletes—alongside Special Olympics and healthcare providers—to provide convenient access to quality healthcare and to ensure a healthier future for Special Olympics athletes who are often at higher risk for experiencing health disparities.”
Since its inception in 1997, Healthy Athletes has delivered over two million free health screenings and trained over 300,000 healthcare professionals, clinical volunteers, and students in using adapted screening protocols and in communicating effectively with people with IDD. These training sessions also aid in building the healthcare community’s capacity to serve the needs of people with IDD outside of Special Olympics events, as providers take these skills back to their practices and provide higher-quality healthcare to people with IDD—not just Special Olympic athletes—in their communities.
The donations to Special Olympics Healthy Athletes are an initiative of Henry Schein Cares, the Company’s global corporate citizenship program.
