It’s quite some time now since the BDA Good Practice of the Year for 2013 was announced. But recent events have caused me to do some thinking. The practice that was awarded the BDA accolade was Honesty Dental Care in Shipley, Yorkshire. Well done that practice! At the time the name seemed interesting, but now even more so. What an intriguing name?
It’s not unknown for me to read the Daily Telegraph from time to time, and one of the features which is always interesting is ‘Honest John’ who gives insights into the motor trade and advice about cars. The implication is, of course, that Honest John is someone who can be trusted, as opposed to many car salesmen who are perceived to be fundamentally bent.
So I wonder if the practice of the year was so called because of a desire to promote themselves as trustworthy and professional when the public might not have the same trust in the rest of the profession? Is that perception of a lack of trust justified?
In January of this year another Yorkshire practitioner from Haworth found himself in the news in the form of a letter to the editor of the Daily Telegraph entitled ‘The public should know of the dangerous decay of NHS dentistry’. Acting as a modern day whistleblower, Anthony Kilcoyne warned the public that government statistics hide the rotten truth about dental disease, noting that a disaster in NHS dentistry comparable to the Mid-Staffordshire Hospital crisis was underway. More than 100 dentists signed the letter, although it is not clear what level of NHS care the signatories themselves provide. The author of the letter however is well known as a private dentist and regards the current situation in the NHS as “the big lie”.
On the back of this, the GDPUK forum and ITV Daybreak conducted a survey which showed some alarming results. Most notable was the response that 92 per cent of the more than 300 respondents think that the NHS target system has led to more patients having a tooth removed when other treatment could have saved it. Appearing on the programme Tony Kilcoyne made clear many of the problems with the target and volume driven UDA system, renaming the Department of Health as the Department of Excuses and pleading for more protected time for NHS dentists. He smoothly ducked the tricky moral and ethical question about whether patients were at risk of unnecessary extractions, passing the job of reassuring those visiting the dentist that day to GDPC chair John Milne - lucky John! NHS England could only muster a short reassuring statement.
The OFT accused dentists of misleading patients about the availability of certain treatments on the NHS in 2012 and it’s hard to see how all this mistrust, truth and lies will reach a conclusion.
It’s possible that the letter in the Daily Telegraph and the ITV programme coupled with the small survey of GDPUK members damaged the reputation of the profession. They might also have diminished public trust in their dentist. On the other hand, the publicity gained might have added weight to the need for serious reform of NHS dentistry. Ministers might now recognise the need to turn the contract pilots into a system that encourages the prevention of disease and is clear in what treatment the NHS will provide. Either way, there’s quite a job to be done if the NHS dental service is to regain the trust of the profession, or indeed the public. 2014 has got off to a lively start, and that’s the truth!