In 2010, a nonprofit group named Sarrell Dental Center was providing dental and optical care for mainly poor children throughout Alabama when it collided with the Alabama Dental Association.

The ADA, questioning Sarrell’s dental practices and lack of oversight by the Alabama Board of Dental Examiners, sought to stop the nonprofit’s expansion.

Sarrell officials accused the ADA of trying to put it out of business, alleging it attempted to prevent University of Alabama dental students from training at the nonprofit.

The Aniston-based Sarrell had grown from providing dental care to 3,500 children to serving 105,000 since opening in 2004. It now operates in 14 locations statewide, including in Athens, and also has a dental bus. Most of its patients are Alabama- or Georgia-eligible Medicaid children between ages 1 and 20 or Blue Cross Blue Shield ALL Kids-eligible children.

Sarrell officials filed an antitrust lawsuit against the ADA, but dropped the suit in 2011 after Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley signed a law allowing Sarrell to operate under oversight by the dental examiners.

This struggle and other issues will be part of a nationwide PBS Frontline documentary titled “Dollars and Dentists,” to be broadcast at 9 p.m. Tuesday, June 26.

Frontline’s programming guide offers this description of its upcoming piece:

“Faults in America’s dental-care system are examined. Included: the scarcity of dentists who accept Medicaid, which causes many poor children to go without care; individuals who turn to emergency rooms for their dental needs.”