Matt Everatt pens a poignant poem ahead of the festive season, addressing the feeling of disillusionment across UK dental labs.
I have been writing about the dwindling numbers of dental technicians over the last few years. Despite my ever-positive outlook on our profession, I cannot ignore the voices and noises made by my peers.
Just last month, the Dental Laboratories Association (DLA) president wrote about a drop in cases received in his own lab, and particularly the drop in higher value cases. Many others have said they are struggling and also seeing less cases coming into their labs. There are exceptions, of course, and some are still busy.
Feeling hopeless
Many UK dental technicians feel disillusioned and even hopeless due to several challenges they face in the industry, combined with what they often perceive as a lack of support or understanding from the General Dental Council (GDC). Here are some of the key reasons why this sentiment exists:
- Lack of recognition and support: dental technicians play a crucial role in creating custom appliances like crowns, bridges and dentures, yet they often feel that their work is undervalued, especially compared to dentists. Despite their technical expertise and the high standards they adhere to, dental technicians feel they are treated as secondary to the dental team rather than essential members of it
- Regulation and fitness to practice pressures: the GDC’s regulatory measures, like fitness to practice investigations, often seem to target individual technicians harshly, sometimes even disproportionately, for minor infractions. This intense scrutiny can feel unfair, particularly when illegal manufacturers or unqualified staff are allowed to operate unchecked, and it creates a climate of fear rather than support
- Overseas competition and price pressures: dentists sometimes choose to send cases to overseas labs in places like China and Turkey because they offer lower prices. This practice undercuts UK technicians and lowers the demand for domestic lab work, forcing many UK labs to operate on thinner margins or face closure. Technicians feel that the GDC could be doing more to advocate for standards that prioritise quality and safety over cost savings
- Lack of a clear career path and professional development: the profession has limited career advancement opportunities, and technicians often feel the GDC doesn’t provide adequate support for professional growth, training or development pathways. The result is a stagnant profession where technicians feel they lack a voice or future, leading many young professionals to leave the field
- Insufficient advocacy against illegal labs and practices: technicians feel that the GDC focuses on punishing registered professionals while not addressing the issue of illegal manufacturing, unregistered labs and dental practices making their own devices outside of the proper regulatory framework. These unregulated outfits may not meet the same safety and quality standards, yet they are sometimes able to secure business due to lower pricing.
Cry for help
Recently an anonymous post came up in the ‘For Dentists, By Dentists’ Facebook group where a dentist was asking colleagues for a recommendation for a ‘cheap NHS lab to do some denture work’. The original post had said: ‘I don’t mind if it’s made in China, as long as it’s signed off by a UK DT (dental technician)’. Perhaps understandably, it irked me somewhat.
So many dentists, and rightly so, moan about dental tourism and people seeking cheap dental treatment in places like Turkey, and then inevitably have to help those patients when it all goes wrong.
Now, I’m not against dentists seeking work from overseas, but in some ways it makes a mockery of the strict regulations us UK dental technicians are shackled with. Our numbers are dwindling and, if UK dentists continue this trend of sending work overseas, we will continue losing good technicians.
I really urge UK dentists to support UK dental technicians and, together, provide patients with the best care possible.
I started writing a poem last year when I was working on a response to the GDC taking task on some dental technicians for some seemingly very minor issues. After seeing this Facebook post, and ruminating a little more, it reignited my inspiration and creativity…
The tale of the techies and the Christmas rush
‘Twas the season of Christmas, when the mad rush begins,
Dental techs busier than rats raiding bins.
With precision and care, they crafted each crown,
But alas! In the clinics, the docs wore a frown.
For dentists had visions – not of gum lines and grooves –
But cheap NHS deals in faraway moves.
‘Send it to China or labs in faraway lands,
The work might be dodgy, but it’ll save us £2.’
The lab teams were baffled, their pride on the line,
Crafting dentures and crowns with standards divine.
They knew each fine margin, each shade, each hue –
Skills honed through hard years, in workshops they grew.
‘Why send this work off?’ the techs asked in dismay.
‘We’re right here, we’re ready, we’ll do it today!’
But dentists just shrugged, with a smirk and a sneer,
‘For pennies, we’ll send it to China, my dear.’
And then from the GDC came a tone sharp and cold,
Looking for scapegoats, while the truth’s left untold.
They hunt for faults in techs who’ve done no wrong,
While ignoring the illegal labs all along.
And fitness to practise? A troubling affair,
Techs on the firing line, but the GDC doesn’t care.
They target the honest, the skilled, and the true,
While dodging the frauds who cut corners in view.
So this Christmas, dear dentists, remember your game,
The UK techs who craft crowns and uphold your name.
For quality matters, in every last bite,
And UK labs work hard to get it just right.
So lift up a glass for your techs this year,
Support local talent, bring holiday cheer!
And may the GDC see, and share some holiday cheer,
Dental lab techs deserve more for Christmas this year.
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