BDA says doing more with less is putting patients at risk
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- Published: Tuesday, 27 October 2015 07:52
- Written by News Editor
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For the eighth consecutive year the BDA is reporting a continuing fall in dentists’ real incomes. It has argued that this state of affairs is now unsustainable and recommended that dentists must receive a minimum of the full one per cent targeted pay increase. Eddie Crouch, the BDA’s Vice Chair and Chair of its Review Body Evidence Committee said: “for the eighth year running dentists have been asked to do more with less.”
The British Dental Association (BDA) has sent its evidence to the Review Body on Doctors’ and Dentists’ Remuneration (DDRB) for 2016/17. Eddie Crouch, the BDA’s Vice Chair and Chair of its Review Body Evidence Committee said: “For the eighth year running dentists have been asked to do more with less. These cuts have consequences, and patients inevitably suffer when practitioners are left incapable of investing in new equipment, while struggling with ever-increasing reams of red tape. The priority for dentists is high quality care, and years of sustained cuts have made it difficult to deliver what our patients quite rightly deserve.
“Governments across the UK appear to have settled on a winning formula for demoralising an entire profession. If we continue on this course, without realistic pay uplifts, we are heading for a retention crisis.”
Key points highlighted in the evidence are:
- Public confidence in NHS dentistry is high and quite rightly needs to remain so;
- Practices are focusing their finances on retaining highly prized practice staff to underpin the dentist workforce, however, some practitioners are not receiving pay increases as a result;
- Taxable incomes continue to remain at significantly lower levels than 2008/9;
- Time spent on non-clinical activity continues to increase putting at risk the time available to see patients and access to NHS services;
- Morale and motivation continues to be very low across the UK, particularly in Northern Ireland;
- Dentist retention rates are not as good as they could be and 30 per cent of associates intend to increase the amount of private care they provide;
- There are problems in recruiting associates in some areas, particularly Wales;
- A third of practice owners plan to retire in the next five years and six per cent of dentists want to leave dentistry and work in another sector within the next five years.
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