It seems a year doesn’t go by without some sort of crisis or demand for action in the Welsh NHS – usually around treatment times. That hasn’t been helped by the Covid-19 pandemic.
One part of the health and social care system which perhaps hasn’t been focused on as much – but faces as many challenges as any other part – is dentistry.
Dental services were subject to an inquiry by the Fifth Senedd’s Health Committee (Senedd Home summary).
As mentioned earlier, the Covid-19 pandemic has delayed the full rollout of the new NHS dental contract.
There has been some confusion over what dental work has been available during the pandemic. Emergency dental treatment has generally been available, with only routine appointments either severely cut back or cancelled. The UDA system was also suspended.
The main issue – particularly during the early waves of the pandemic – was “aerosol-generating procedures”, which present a risk of transmitting Covid-19 by blowing the virus out of someone’s mouth and around the room.
There are very few dental treatments that are not “aerosol-generating procedures” in some way as it usually means anything involving a dental drill or polisher. Such procedures – if needed in an emergency – were at one point only restricted to designated emergency dental treatment centres in each health board area.
That has since relaxed, though most dental practices are still – quite understandably – approaching treatment with caution. Resultingly, there’s a huge treatment backlog which a sizable number of dentists estimate will take between one year and two years to clear.
There’s also the financial impact to consider.
For once, it was perhaps more advantageous for dentists to take on more NHS work (where at least some income was guaranteed) than work wholly privately. At one point private dental practices were said to be at risk of mass redundancies or even closure but it’s unclear whether any of that has happened.
Whether the phasing-in of the new GDS contract and the experiences of dentists during the pandemic changes attitudes towards NHS dental work remains to be seen.
I would be cautiously optimistic as the pilot seems to have the conditional backing of the BDA in Wales, but the new contract remains very much a work in progress. It’s still at the whim of the pandemic and it could take many years for NHS treatment and registrations to be more widely available to adults in Wales.
