Remarkably he said he’d be pleased if patient pressure produced a ‘Lidl to Waitrose’ model with all the small retailers in the
middle.
While no one would argue against the importance of patient-centred care being at the heart of a good practice, the notion that we should all be competing like retailers surely grossly oversimplifies health care by suggesting once again that dentistry is a market, which as far as clinical care is concerned, it is not. In terms of customer care some of the best companies stress the fact that they
know the customer has a choice. Sad that they don’t with the GDC – as there is only one. At least for now. Look out Mr Moyes, here comes the CQC.
A jobsworth of a smile
Recent press speculation has centred around comments made by a social scientist who suggested that bad teeth are now affecting people’s chances of getting certain jobs. It is hardly a new revelation given all that we know about caries, for example, being linked with deprivation and all the work on the social determinants of oral health.
It reminded me of a job advert I saw many years ago when I was at dental school and commuted from home for a while into Euston station. Each morning for a number of weeks I was confronted by a billboard with a photo of a snuggle-toothed railway man with a gappy smile and obviously poor oral hygiene (I was a very diligent student I’ll have you know) advertising jobs with the then British Rail, I was tempted to write to BR suggesting that they might use someone with a better set of pearlies.
I then remember pondering that perhaps it was actually a clever use of image as this was the type of person at which the advert was aimed. Maybe advertisers knew a thing or two back then even if they didn’t express it as grandly as social determinants.
Have a long brew
Researchers do, of course, have to go to extremes to test out their hypotheses but recent work on tea staining from the USA does seem to be pushing it a bit far. To study the effect on tooth enamel of different teas, a study in Iowa involved placing molars in a variety of brews for 25 hours, with a refresh every five hours before measuring penetration. Citrus tea had the greatest effect, penetrating to 83 microns, fruity tea came next, followed by regular black tea, floral and green. Interesting, but I timed how long it took me to sip, swallow and drink a cup of tea. About four minutes, so the extrapolation of that would be…?