Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, how many and what proportion of NHS dentists are accepting new adult patients that are not entitled to free dental care as of October 2023.

Last year we introduced changes to the 2006 dental contract, which included a requirement that dentists must update the National Health Service website with their availability at least every 90 days, making access clearer for patients.

Latest data from the end of September 2023 showed that, of the practices that had updated within the preceding 90 days, 769 practices reported that they were accepting non-charge exempt adults, which is 13% of a total of approximately 5,915 practices.