DT News - UK - Quality of UK dental services remains high

Dental Tribune International

Thu. 20 October 2016

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LONDON, UK: Only 1 per cent of all dental practices inspected by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in 2015 and 2016 required enforcement action for not meeting the regulator’s criteria. The overall majority were found to deliver high-quality care, the body announced in its State of Care report issued last week.

At least nine out of ten practices complied with the CQC’s five key tests for being caring, responsive, well led, safe and effective.

Of the five core community services, which include services for children, young people and families, as well as for adults, and in-patient services and community end-of-life care, dentistry was found to deliver the highest care, with 86 per cent of all inspected providers achieving a rating of good or outstanding from the CQC.

The results were based on almost 1,000 dental care inspections the CQC conducted during the last two years in dental practices around the UK. Of those, only 10 per cent needed to make improvements in fields like leadership and safety, the organisation said.

“As in other sectors, where there are concerns, they tend to be related to the well-led and safe key questions—for example not carrying out mandatory audits or having incomplete dental records. This can mean that dentists do not have the right information to hand when they are treating a patient,” it is stated in the report.

Despite the good results in most sectors of social and health care, the CQC has warned that these levels cannot be sustained in the long run owing to factors like a growing and ageing population, people with more long-term conditions, and a challenging economic climate.

“Colleagues continue to provide an excellent, committed service, despite a 35 per cent drop in taxable income over the last decade, and without a penny of government investment. Dentists are subsidising this high quality care from their own pockets. In the long term this situation is unsustainable,” agreed Chair of the British Dental Association’s Principal Executive Committee Mick Armstrong.

“There are huge challenges facing the dental profession but in spite of these the CQC provides proof—if that were needed—that we remain the most efficient, trusted and compliant of healthcare sectors,” he said.

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