Attitudes of general dental practitioners in Wales towards employing dental hygienist-therapists

Dental therapy in the United Kingdom: part 3. Financial aspects of current working practices

“…3 In the past, evaluation of therapists' output has shown it to be comparable to that of hygienists, 4 while high productivity can result from incentives and organisation. [5][6][7] Since UK therapists do not require direct personal supervision, they may be more cost-effective than their American counterparts. 2 For many years, dental therapists were restricted to working in the hospital and salaried public dental services (SDS) performing a limited range of clinical competencies.…”

“…6 When principal dentists were consulted in Wales, 29% thought that hygienist/therapists should be self-employed, 22% that they should be employed while 33% stated no preference. There was concern that expected salaries might be disproportionate to therapists' earning and productivity capacity, and that at £30 per hour they would not prove cost-effective (having to gross £50-£60 per hour).…”

“…Overall, it was suggested that practice profi tability could be improved by employing hygienist/therapists on an hourly rate once UDAs were introduced. 6 In England and Wales, there seems to be some professional misunderstanding about the earning of UDAs. It is correct to say that the UDA earned can only be attributed to a dentist with a performer number.…”

Dental therapy in the United Kingdom: part 1. Developments in therapists' training and role

“…The current need for therapists to work to a dentist's treatment plan requires dentists' awareness and acceptance of the potential of that role. 11,23 The clinical responsibilities of the dentist vis-à-vis that of the therapist must be clear and complementary and will benefi t from a fusion of parallel and integrated training opportunities, especially where there are learning opportunities under the same roof. In the future, the dentist undergraduate workforce could expect to build up leadership, management and supervisory talents as team co-ordinators, as well as developing postgraduate specialist skills.…”

Assessing the efficacy and social acceptability of using hygienist-therapists as front-line clinicians

“…Other surveys have identified substantial negativity 25 and a lack of understanding of HTs' roles and responsibilities. 26,28 The evidence from medicine suggests that patients quickly adapt to new roles within primary health care, 20,29 but regular adult dental attenders may react differently should the HTs adopt a more frontline role. 30 To test the hypothesis that HTs could offer a cost-effective and acceptable alternative to GDPs when undertaking the check-up, an experimental design is required, such as a pragmatic randomised controlled trial.…”