David Smith discusses the dental technician shortage and how to rebuild a skilled, future-ready workforce.
I recently delivered a presentation on the innovative work being done at Yeovil College to help solve the workforce crisis. My lecture began by drawing attention to the alarming data on the registration of dentists and dental care professionals (DCPs) on the General Dental Council (GDC) register.
The data shows that registration for the whole dental team has increased since 2008, while there is a clear decline of registered dental technicians – a figure that has fallen every year up to its lowest level of 5,025 in 2024. Shockingly, the number of new technicians entering the UK register for 2024 was just 168. Dental technicians made up just 1.4% of the total 11,894 new registrants to enter the GDC register in 2024.
In Germany, the ratio of dentists to technicians is 2:1, while in the UK it’s 9:1.
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