Communications from the Chief Dental Officer England

We have received two communications from The Office of the Chief Dental Officer which we would like to share with our membership:

Publication of Restorative Commissioning Standard

The Office of the Chief Dental Officer and NHS England and NHS Improvement have produced a commissioning standard for commissioners of restorative dentistry in England. The Standard will support NHS England in commissioning consistent patient-centred restorative dental care services.

This guide aims to offer a standardised framework for the local commissioning of specialist and specialised restorative dentistry services. It is intended to be used by commissioners to ensure that they are improving access to care, based on patient needs, with demonstrable high-value health outcomes experienced by patients.

Commissioners will need to work closely with local restorative dentistry Managed Clinical Networks (MCNs), Consultants in Dental Public Health and Local Dental Networks (LDNs) or dental system leadership teams. Together they will be responsible for delivering the best place-based patient journey possible that meets the needs of diverse local patient population groups and works towards reducing inequalities in access to treatment and outcomes while achieving the nationally expected standards of care provision.

To download a copy of this standard go to https://www.england.nhs.uk/primary-care/dentistry/dentistry-publications/#standards

Publication of Urgent Dental Care Commissioning Standard

The Office of the Chief Dental Officer England and NHS England and NHS Improvement have produced a commissioning standard for Urgent Dental Care services in England. The standard will support NHS England in commissioning consistent patient-centred urgent dental care services. It has been developed with patient and public input to ensure that includes the aspects of urgent care that are important to patients - for example travelling times, location of service and the environment where the service is delivered.

Implementation of the standards should ensure that patients and the public are aware of what services are available, how to access them and what they should expect from the services themselves. This commissioning standard aims to ensure urgent primary care dental services in England are high quality, responsive to local needs and deliver best outcomes for service users.  It will support development of urgent dental services that are seamless with other urgent care services to ensure people with urgent dental needs are seen in the right place and at the right time.

To download a copy of this standard go to https://www.england.nhs.uk/primary-care/dentistry/dentistry-publications/#standards