North East and North Cumbria dental services are set to receive a £3 million boost in funding, thanks to a new initiative designed to “protect, retain and stabilise” local dental services in the community.
Having recently taken on commissioning responsibilities for the region’s dental services, North East and North Cumbria ICB has revealed an initial plan to address inequalities across the footprint, with a focus on the most deprived and underserved communities.
The Primary Care Dental Access Recovery Plan has been agreed in outline by the board and includes £3 million to support dentistry during the 2023/24 financial year, with the ICB highlighting how this will enable them to offer additional funding to dental practices with the potential to create up to 27,000 extra appointments across the region.
The funding will also allow practices to recruit new staff to support dental triage through the NHS 111 phone service, as well as provide extra clinical treatment sessions to match anticipated periods of demand.
The plan is to target additional capacity support towards patients with complex needs and ‘looked after children’ who may have increased difficulty accessing dental services.
Dr Neil O’Brien, the ICB’s medical director, says: “Since the pandemic, dental services have faced massive challenges in meeting the increasing and more complex needs of our patients, and this is an important step towards protecting, retaining and stabilising local NHS dentistry for the benefit of our patients and our dedicated dental staff.”
In other news from the region, we recently explored the £35 million three-year programme aiming to bring the NHS, local authorities and VCSE networks together to tackle inequalities in the North East.
Earlier in the year, we spoke to Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes ICB chief executive Felicity Cox about how to improve inequalities in integrated care systems.
