The top 50 influencers in the UK dental profession

The results have been compiled in our hugely popular annual readers’ poll to find out the most influential people in the dental sector – and Kevin Lewis topped the poll for an incredible third year running.

Thousands of you voted online and here are the results in full!

1. KEVIN LEWIS Kevin tops the poll, emphatically underlining the respect and admiration in which he is held within the profession. A significant contribution to Kevin’s overall total is the fact that, while compiling their top 10, many people put Kevin somewhere in their top five. Several of the candidates who finished just below him in this list were many people’s first choices, but didn’t feature as heavily on the choices of others, proving that Kevin’s influence clearly spreads well beyond his immediate ‘fan base’.

In short, no one else achieved such a broad spectrum of votes. Kevin spent 20 years in full-time general practice, developing special interests in preventive dentistry and practice management.

He joined Dental Protection in 1989 where he is now dental director. He has written textbooks on dental practice management and contributed to two CD training programmes on infection control. He is also a popular speaker, lecturing extensively all over the world on a variety of issues. But it is perhaps in the field of writing where Kevin has established a glistening reputation. He was the associate editor of Dental Practice for 25 years and is now a consultant editor for Dentistry magazine, in which he has been writing a regular column since 2006.

Through his countless articles, he has become renowned for his vibrant and witty prose, imparting his considered insight into UK dentistry in his own, unique fashion.

2. EDDIE CROUCH In 2007, Eddie, a Birmingham orthodontist, was the highest new entry into this poll after he played a major role in founding the pressure group Challenge. Since then, Challenge – established to provide help and support for GDPs who feel they have suffered since the introduction of the new contract – has increased in profile, while Eddie himself recently hit the headlines after taking South Birmingham Primary Care Trust (PCT) to court.

Crouch won the first stage of his case when the judge ruled that the PCT had breached NHS regulations by suggesting it could terminate his contract ‘at any time and without cause’, but Crouch lost his claim that the PCT did not adequately consult the public over the new contract.

Mr Justice Collins said of Crouch, when summing up the case: ‘He has obviously achieved something of importance.’

Eddie had managed to raise around £40,000 after asking his colleagues for donations in order to seek the judicial review at the High Court, an indication of both his influence within the profession at ground level and his enthusiasm to carry out his convictions, which clearly struck a chord with many of his colleagues throughout the UK.

3. PADDI LUND This enigmatic Australian once again achieves a top 10 rating. Paddi has been an enormous influence on dental practitioners worldwide, following the success he made of his practice in Queensland. Based upon an unconventional business approach, his invitation-only practice defies all conventional business paradigms.

Paddi works a 22-hour week yet makes three times more than the majority of his colleagues, his staff turnover levels are very low and customers are queuing up – despite the fact that he locked his front door, took down all his signs and removed his name from the phone book.

The inspirational techniques of this quirky ‘management guru’ have resulted in Paddi being a hugely popular speaker around the world.

Paddi has been in private practice as a dentist for more than 30 years. After graduating from the University of Adelaide, he trained in the UK and was accepted as a Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons.

He bought his first practice from a retiring dental practitioner in a working-class suburb of Brisbane shortly afterwards, and he has been in the same business since – building, growing, learning, and finally finding happiness and profits.

4. Michael Wise 5. Amarjit Gill 6. Edward Lynch 7. Raj Rattan 8. Christopher Orr 9. Chris Barrow 10. Bridget Crump 11. Simon Hocken 12. Roy Higson 13. Crispian Scully 14. David Houston 15. Ellie Paul 16. Trevor Burke 17. Ashok Sethi 18. Paul Tipton 19. Stephen Hancocks 20. Gordon Christensen 21. Bob Khanna 22. Barry Cockcroft 23 Gordon Brown 24. Hew Mathewson 25. Manny Vasant 26. John Tiernan 27. Vinod Joshi 28. Tony Jacobs 29. John Besford 30. Derek Watson 31. Nairn Wilson 32 Nasser Barghi 33. Michael Watson 34. Wyman Chan 35. Abid Faqir 36. Lester Ellman 37. Peter Ward 38. Margaret Seward 39. Ruby Austin 40. Per-Ingvar Branemark 41. Ann Keen 42. David Bloom 43. Mervyn Druian 44. Julian English 45. Larry Rosenthal 46. Linda Greenwall 47. Jennifer de St Georges 48. Joe Rich 49. William Dorfman 50. Mike Martin.

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