Thousands of patients across England will be able to access urgent and emergency dental care as the government and NHS rolls out 700,000 extra urgent appointments.
Announced today by health minister Stephen Kinnock, the move marks a commitment to a pledge made in the Labour manifesto last summer.
The extra appointments will be available from April and have been targeted at ‘dental deserts’ – areas where patients particularly struggle to access NHS dentists. This includes parts of the east of England, such as Norfolk and Waveney, where statistics show there are 31 NHS dentists respectively for every 100,000 people – significantly below the national average.
Each integrated care board (ICB) has been given a target of urgent appointments to roll out, based on estimated local levels of unmet need for urgent NHS care. Levels of unmet need are calculated by measures including looking at how many people tried and failed to get an NHS dentist appointment in the area.
Patients will be able to access these appointments by contacting their usual dental practice, or calling NHS 111 if they are without a regular dentist or need help out-of-hours.
‘Years of neglect’
Jason Wong, chief dental officer for England, said: ‘Dentists are working hard to help as many patients as possible but too many people experience difficulties in accessing NHS dental services.
‘It is vital that we do more to improve access – we are working with local systems to prioritise this, which includes providing 700,000 additional urgent dental appointments to help make it quicker and easier for those most in need to be seen and treated on the NHS and we are incentivising dentists to work in underserved areas so that all areas of the country can receive the care they need.’
Health minister Stephen Kinnock added: ‘We promised we would end the misery faced by hundreds of thousands of people unable to get urgent dental care. Today we’re starting to deliver on that commitment.
‘NHS dentistry has been left broken after years of neglect, with patients left in pain without appointments, or queueing around the block just to be seen.
‘Through our plan for change, this government will rebuild dentistry – focusing on prevention, retention of NHS dentists and reforming the NHS contract to make NHS work more appealing to dentists and increase capacity for more patients. This will take time, but today marks an important step towards getting NHS dentistry back on its feet.’
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How has the profession reacted?
Shiv Pabary, chair of the BDA’s General Dental Practice Committee, said: ‘It’s progress, but Government could have fired the starting gun on commissioning urgent care last summer.“Action here will translate into just two extra slots a month for each NHS dentist.
‘Ministers must now confront the failed contract that’s left millions with no options.’
Neil Carmichael, executive chair of the Association of Dental Groups (ADG), said: ‘Whilst the ADG recognises today’s pledges as some progress towards resolving the UK’s dentistry crisis, our Association’s concern is that the government is leaning on dental practices to fund urgent and routine care through their businesses’ “mixed economy” structure.
‘Without proper reform, realistic funding and a focus on the inadequate dental workforce (remember, there are currently over 3,000 vacant dentist positions that we are unable to fill) we cannot hope to see significant progress in getting dentistry in the UK back on its feet in the near future.’
‘Dire need’
John Makin is head of the Dental Defence Union (DDU). He said: ‘We welcome the announcement today about an increase in numbers of urgent dental appointments as there is a dire need to address gaps in access to NHS dentistry.
‘However, while this may address some of the funding needs which prevent people accessing NHS care, it doesn’t address some of the fundamental causes of why colleagues are stepping away from providing that care.
‘The reasons for that include dental professionals being frustrated about being unable to meet patient need under the current system. Added to that is the hostile dentolegal climate in which the ever-increasing demands on dentistry have led to a corresponding rise in complaints.
‘Dental professionals are also concerned about action by the General Dental Council (GDC), which is working with an outdated regulatory system. Reforms to the clinical negligence system and a fairer, more timely and more proportionate model of regulation could help ease the burden on our dental practitioners and our NHS.’
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