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Fears raised over training shortage
30th Mar 2007
A shortage of orthodontic specialists is forcing patients to consult inexperienced practitioners and risks damaging clinical research, the government has been warned. More than 30 MPs have signed a Parliamentary motion expressing concern about the shortage of training places for orthodontic specialists in Britain. The motion notes that one fifth of all orthodontic specialists are due to retire in the next six years and that the shortage is ‘driving patients to consult practitioners who have insufficient training and experience’. Pointing out geographic inequalities which have developed, it says there are just two orthodontic specialists serving the whole of Hull and the East Riding of Yorkshire. And it supports a call by the British Orthodontic Society (BOS) for the government to ‘increase the number of funded training posts in UK dental schools.’ Dr Friedy Luther, chair of BOS’s University Teachers’ Group, told Dentistry that since 1994 there had been a 70% drop in the number of lecture staff in orthodontics. This decline had taken place against a backdrop of a near-doubling of the numbers of undergraduates in some dental schools. The reasons for the decline were reduced promotion prospects caused by competition between faculties and an increase in the workload of clinical academics. Faced with the prospect of four years’ training to achieve a PhD, and another year or two to secure a senior lecturer post, a number of students simply got ‘fed up’, she said. As a consequence, there are now only four orthodontic lecturers in training in the whole country. Dr Luther said: ‘If undergraduates become dentists there will be a number who want to be [orthodontic] specialists but no one to train them. ‘You would end up with an erosion of standards. We won’t have the research, evidence-based work and new methods coming through, apart from what came out of other countries. It’s pretty serious.’ What was needed to recruit and retain staff was not a ‘massive increase’ in cash but sufficient funding targeted specifically at dentistry to place more clinical academic trainers in the UK’s dental schools. Stuart Graham, Labour MP for Beverley and Holderness, presented the motion to the House of Commons with signatures of support from Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem MPs. Dr Luther added: ‘This engagement by MPs with the problems we are facing is invaluable. The motion implicitly recognises that the number of orthodontic specialists and hospital consultants is not going to increase unless there is investment in the specialty at university level. ‘More training posts are needed in order to deliver more specialists and more academics to train the dentists of the future. ‘It’s not a pay rise we want. We want reassurance for those entering an academic career that they will get recognition and support and, in the long run, a career structure and posts.’ By Andy Tate, parliamentary correspondent
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