NHS pledges to make improvements after people in Bradford district share experiences of dentistry
Dental services in West Yorkshire: Frequently asked questions
From July, NHS England will give responsibility for planning and organising NHS dental services to the West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board (ICB).
Through the West Yorkshire Voice network, people from across the region shared their experiences to help the board plan what needs to happen next to improve services.
Healthwatch, working together in West Yorkshire (Bradford District and Craven, Calderdale, Kirklees, Leeds and Wakefield), prepared a report on access to NHS dentistry, and a video highlighting people's experiences was shown at a meeting of the ICB in May 2023 (below).
UPDATE: September 2023
- A range of recommendations has been approved that seek to improve dentistry, for both patients and the profession, including improving communications.
- A proposal has been developed to invest an additional £4.5m this year. This investment will continue to help access to urgent dental care for all people.
- Working to be more flexible when commissioning dental services to help prevent bad experiences and difficulties getting to see a dentist.
- Establishing a local working group, open to patients (including private dental users), people without an NHS dentist, educators, dentists, GPs and parents. This is an opportunity to have your say, share experiences, and influence the delivery of dental services (see below).
- A frequently asked questions page has been set up to offer information to patients.
In our report to the ICB in May 2023, Healthwatch highlighted "quite shocking feedback and statistics" from the past 10 years relating to people's experiences of NHS dentistry.
The report outlines how little has changed despite Healthwatch working hard to represent the patient voice: "We have invested a huge amount of time in raising issues around dental access with NHS England, local dental committee, local dentists, the British Dental Association, local councillors, scrutiny committees, local MPs, and many more organisations and individuals.
"We have persisted with a number of different initiatives and approaches, and have gathered feedback from thousands of people. We have taken the time to understand the widest range of perspectives and present the information in a constructive and competent way."
The report highlights gap in provision: "Significant numbers of adults and children in West Yorkshire are unable to access routine NHS dentistry.
"This puts them at greater risk of developing significant oral health issues and needing urgent and emergency dental treatment. West Yorkshire is one of the areas in the Yorkshire and Humber with the highest incidence of incisor caries in children aged 5."
The Healthwatch report calls for three key adjustments in the delivery of NHS dentistry services in West Yorkshire:
- Patient centred, prevention focused dental care provision – we continue to be concerned that the current NHS dentistry contract proliferates an unacceptable attitude toward patients and their needs. We would like to see an uplift in funding and commissioning numbers, a contract that focuses on assisting NHS patients to prevent dental crises, through improved access to dental care and information about dental hygiene.
- A move away from the UDA model of dental contracting, improving access for people with protected characteristics and complex dental needs – the current contractual model for provision of NHS dentistry incentivises providing care for people who are healthy, rather than offering assistance to those with more dental problems.
- Clear information about the availability of dental care – in West Yorkshire, it can be incredibly difficult to find an NHS dentist taking on NHS patients because transparent and easily accessed information about availability is not available.
Following the meeting, Cathy Elliott, Chair of NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board, said: "Healthwatch colleagues explained that dental and oral health is the number one area of concern highlighted by local people and communities. Learning about local people’s experiences about accessing an NHS dental appointment and urgent care reminded us how very important this area of health is for everyone and that improvements to services are needed.
"Flexible commissioning of dental services was highlighted throughout the session and in the Board meeting, and we have asked Ian Holmes, Director of Strategy and Partnerships for NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board, to give you an update on work underway and to consider all your feedback in more detail.
"This will help to ensure we do all we can to work together to address the challenges and concerns people face as well as keeping in view opportunities to improve."
Ian Holmes said: "The Board absolutely recognised the issues that were raised in the engagement session. We understand that access to NHS Dental Services can be difficult, and this is down to several systemic and long-standing issues, which we are working hard to address.
"We are committed to making improvements on dental and oral health services for people and communities. At the meeting we approved a series of recommendations which we believe will make a positive difference over time."
Some of the feedback shared from Bradford district
"Couldn't find a NHS dentist within my area. All seemed to be willing to take on private patients or a half and half type patient. Perhaps employ/ encourage more nhs dentists. Have newly qualified dentists work in nhs for 3/5 years before going private"
"As an NHS patient you get no preventative care… never get a scale and polish, but they would happily book a private appointment for this."
"Extreme difficulty in getting vulnerable looked-after children registered with a dentist."
"Not able to get a dental appointment when I am an NHS patient, and a filling had come out, I did not want to pay private as I was told I would then lose my NHS place, so I had to say that it hurt after 8 weeks putting in temporary filling which did not work"
"There are no dentists available and if you get to be able to register you and your children, you are then told that the wait is about a year or over 1000 patients, this is not acceptable."
"We need more NHS dentists available for children especially vulnerable or children in care, In fact, there should be dedicated dental practices for any children in care as the dental health can be atrocious."
"It took several years on the waiting list before my dentist would register me as an NHS patient after moving back to Bradford. The care since then has been good. However as a GP I struggle as patients cannot access free and timely NHS dentistry including when at the end of life and it would improve quality of life to treat dental pain, fix dentures etc. Not everyone fits the criteria for the salaried dental service and emergency appointments are often in Leeds which is difficult to get to from some areas of Bradford."
Watch the full NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board meeting from May 16, 2023 below
Downloads
Documents from and relating to the meeting, including the Healthwatch report on NHS dentistry in West Yorkshire:
