Dentistry: Training

(asked on 24th January 2023) - View Source

Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what steps his Department is taking to increase the number of dental training places in (a) England and (b) East of England.


Answered by
Neil O'Brien Portrait
Neil O'Brien
This question was answered on 1st February 2023

The Government trains around 800 dentists per year but the cap on dental school places was temporarily lifted for students who completed A-Levels in 2020 and in 2021 and who had an offer from a university in England to study dentistry, subject to their grades. As a result, 895 dental students entered training in 2020 and 980 dental students entered training in 2021 helping ensure a larger potential pipeline for dentists in coming years, including in the East of England

The Government funded extra 19 dental specialty posts in 2022/23. Additional Dental Specialty Training posts are being targeted to high needs specialties and geographies to seek to improve dental training distribution, including in the East of England.

The Government has committed to publishing a workforce plan this year and this will include independently verified projections for the number of doctors, nurses and other professionals that will be needed in 5-, 10- and 15-years’ time, taking full account of improvements in retention and productivity. The workforce plan is for the whole of the NHS workforce, including dental care professionals.

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