Hundreds of people queued in Bristol recently when a new NHS dentist opened, highlighting the national shortage of NHS dentists. Those queuing in Bristol reported frustration and desperation in trying to find an NHS dentist, as they could not afford to pay “hundreds of pounds” for dental treatment.
A BBC investigation in 2022 found that nine out of 10 dentists across the UK are not accepting new NHS patients, with eight in 10 not taking on children. Although the worst problems are found in the north and south-west of England, there is also a growing lack of NHS dental services in Sussex.
Sussex dental shortage is ‘distressing’
The “distressing” shortage of NHS dentists across Sussex was described in detail at a recent meeting of a West Sussex County Council (WSCC) health and adult social care committee. Councillors were told that eighteen dental practices in West Sussex have handed back their NHS contracts since 2020, with Arun, Mid Sussex, Worthing, Chichester, Horsham, Crawley and Adur all losing NHS dental services since October 2023.
Dr Charlotte Keeble, director for pharmacy, optometry and dentistry commissioning at NHS Sussex, submitted a report to the WSCC committee, updating members on the work being carried out to understand what barriers people faced when trying to access NHS dental care, and what is being done to improve things.
Currently only 73% of Sussex people who tried to access NHS dental services over the last two years got an appointment, with reasons for not being able to do so split between a lack of appointments and dentists not taking new NHS patients.
Poor contracts
One of the major barriers appeared to be the contracts under which the dentists work, which require them to carry out a certain number of Units of Dental Activity – the number of units delivered depends on the amount of treatment given. For example, a check-up might be one unit while a filling might be three. An example reported by BBC News is Dr Sami Butt from Haywards Heath, who stopped treating NHS patients in April last year after 20 years. He said it was a “tough decision” but “the scheme was underfunded and it was a terrible contract”.
While the government claims to have invested £3bn each year to deliver dentistry across the country, some dentists feel the funding associated with the contracts is not enough to make working with the NHS viable.
Call for dentists to stay in the NHS
Agi Tarnowski, senior dental officer, special care dentistry, Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust, described the number of contracts being handed back in Sussex as “worryingly high”, adding: “No practices in Sussex that provide NHS services can afford to be NHS dentists alone. They need private income.”
Calling for more to be done to persuade dentists to stay with the NHS, she said: “Time is of the essence. We are losing people now at such a rapid pace that if we don’t act now and we can’t move things, I’m really worried about what will be left of NHS dentistry.”
Personal Sussex experiences
The desperate lack of NHS dentistry services across East and West Sussex was confirmed by two Sussex residents who got in touch with Sussex Bylines to describe their own experiences. One, a resident of a small village in West Sussex, told us, “My last appointment, at my NHS dentist, was in June 2023 when I was referred to a private clinic for two extractions under sedation and I am still waiting. I have had to take two prescriptions of antibiotics due to infection.
“I phoned the clinic in August 2023, to ask when I would have the treatment done, to be told there is a long waiting list and it would be about three months. I then expected to hear from them before Christmas but there’s been silence. I phoned again this morning to remind them of my previous call only to be told, yet again, that the wait is three months. The receptionist, when asked, told me that private patients have a wait of four to six weeks and the cost for the same treatment was £699.”
Paul Clift, who has recently moved from South-East London to Eastbourne, told us about his fruitless search for an NHS dentist, in contrast to finding a GP. “That was no problem at all – I registered with a very good one [GP] only three streets away. But find a dentist? According to Dentists near Eastbourne on the NHS website, only two or three are taking NHS patients. But when I contacted them, they weren’t taking any new patients at all. The receptionist at one I visited in person told me that no Eastbourne practice is taking new patients. I replied, ‘So I should keep my dentist in south London, then?’ and she said ‘Yes’. She also told me that the NHS listings page for dentists is not kept up to date anyway. It’s hard enough finding a dentist in London; down here, it seems impossible.”
Need to lobby government
Members of the WSCC committee agreed that pressure needed to be kept up when it came to lobbying MPs and the Secretary of State about the need to rework the contract at a national level. James Walsh (Lib Dem, Littlehampton East) said NHS dentistry in parts of West Sussex had “largely collapsed” and accused recent governments of being content to see “NHS dental services wither on the vine”. Those who have been searching for local dental practices in Sussex and Bristol would definitely agree.
