The area of Wales where almost half of NHS dental appointments aren’t being used

Twm Owen – Local Democracy Reporter

Nearly half of the urgent dental appointments available in one area of Wales aren’t being used, NHS bosses have said.

Across Gwent around 20 per cent of the slots paid for by the NHS to carry out emergency work are left unfilled while in Monmouthshire the latest figures for September show 44 per cent weren’t taken.

The Anuerin Bevan University Health Board, that funds NHS dental care for the area, said it is considering whether it has assessed the need correctly or if people are unaware of how they can access the appointments.

Urgent

It is also hoped a new portal, that will act as a first central waiting list for dental treatment, will be rolled out across Gwent from November 20 will help raise awarness of the urgent appointments.

People will be able to access the central website, from the health board’s site, and it will have a helpline for people to register by phone.

Dental services are provided by private practices and in Gwent there are more than 70 offering NHS treatment broken down into 10 practices in Monmouthshire, 11 in Blaenau Gwent, 14 in Newport and the same number in Torfaen with 25 in the Caerphilly unitary authority area.

Though six practices, including four in Monmouthshire, handed back NHS contracts this year Aneurin Bevan’s primary care director Lloyd Hambridge said all have been retendered meaning patients who were registered with an NHS dentist will have been referred to another practice.

Contract

Mr Hambridge also said an increasing number of practices are opting to work under the Welsh Government’s new dental contract rather than the older contract agreed in 2006.

He said: “We’ve had more practices move to the reformed contract than the (older) contracts. Some feel this works well and are voting with their feet and changing contracts.”

The older 2006 contracts were based on “units of dental activity” such as six monthly regular check ups but the new contract is based on assessed clinical need.

Mr Hambridge said the health board’s view is the new contract means “the right people are seen at the right time as opposed to a routine element, with people who may not need (a check up) seen on a routine basis.”

He added: “You now have a time period appropriate to your oral health and that is reviewed and followed up.”

During the 2023/24 financial year eight Monmouthshire practices worked under the older units of activity contract but now all 10 are on the new contract.

Councillors were remined practices that had stopped working with NHS hadn’t gone out of business but simply stopped working with the publicly funded service.