Dental health is a crucial part of NHS services and, as part of my continuing efforts to shine a light on the very real challenges currently facing the sector and work with partners to try and bring about better service for patients here in Mid Norfolk, I recently wrote to local NHS leaders to ask what more can be done.

I am pleased to report that I have had a response from the East of England’s Director of Primary Care and Public Health at NHS England and NHS Improvement – who has set out some of the measures that have been/are being taken to try and improve the situation:

• Since April of this year, dental practices are being asked to deliver 95% of their contracted activity as part of the continuing efforts to ramp-up local activity in this key service.
• Norfolk now has five Urgent Dental Centres to help meet urgent needs in the county, and all providers in the region have been approached with the offer of a more flexible contract that would allow them to offer more ‘chair-time’ for the most urgent cases.
• Central Government funding has been used to secure more sessions for local patients.
• Four new dental services are due to go live in Norfolk this summer – providing a much needed boost in capacity. NHS England and NHS Improvement are advertising for further services which they hope to bring online.

There is a strong acknowledgement however that there remains much more to do if the real pressures being experienced at this time are to be adequately tackled and that’s why I have taken up their offer of a meeting in the coming weeks to explore this issue in greater depth and find out what more can be done, and quickly.

For further updates, please continue to check my website here.