This post is partly based on a presentation by Elizabeth Jones, dean of postgraduate dentistry, Health Education England(HEE).  She has a bird’s eye view of the key issues facing the dental workforce, career development and education in the UK. In her presentation at the Westminster Health Forum 5th July 2016: “Next steps for dentistry and oral health: regulation, prevention and dental contract reform”, this is how she describe what the dental workforce will need:  

Elizabeth Jones,
Dean of Postgraduate Dentistry,
Health Education England

Those in the workforce now need to be prepared for future ways of working: 

• - ""We need to build dental careers in primary care
• - But we need to ensure realistic expectations 
• - Prevention in dentistry is key to reduce future needs
• - But we need dentists to also perform complex treatment on certain population Groups.""

Back in 2013 Health Education England (HEE) commissioned “Securing the Future of the Workforce Supply: Dental care professionals stocktake” published Oct 2014, here is the full report  bit.ly/2ae6e8v.

The report is intended to show the likely direction for the dental workforce, as expressed by stakeholders and supported by the proposed changes to the dental care contract, piloted and now at the prototype phase. The report projections take into account significant expected changes to the skill mix.

What the report does not do is attempt to forecast precise workforce numbers.  It also emphasized that for changes in skill mix to happen; there must be a concerted effort and commitment by the profession and stakeholders. For the principal projections, the report calculation of future demand is based on the population’s total need.

As the digital editor for www.2020Dentistry.com I was invited by Westminster Health Forum to report a keynote seminar “Next steps for dentistry and oral health: regulation, prevention and dental contract reform. This short blog is the first in a series of posts intended to kick start the debate on the anticipated changes in the dental workforce, skills mix , primary dental care,  and what all this will mean to a future dental workforce.  DCPs can and should have an input to the shaping of their profession. Have your say, post a comment, tweet and share with friends and colleagues.