Thousands of adults and children in South skipping dentists' visits
Health bosses say there's 'still a way to go' to improve the figures
Health leaders have acknowledged there is “still a way to go” despite progress on the number of adults and children in Southampton seeing a dentist.
New annual figures from the NHS reported that 56.9 per cent of children in the city were seen by a dentist in the past 12 months.
This was an improvement from 47.6 per cent in last year’s figures.
For adults, 40.3 per cent were seen in the past two years, up from 37 per cent in the previous year’s data.
Based on the latest population statistics, 122,766 adults and 21,708 children in Southampton had not been to the dentist in the past 24 months and 12 months, respectively.
Dr Debbie Chase, Southampton City Council’s director of public health, said: “While it’s positive to see an increase in the number of residents accessing dentists compared to the previous year, we recognise that there is still a way to go.
“To achieve this aim, Southampton City Council will continue to support oral promotion services, with a particular focus on targeting our most vulnerable communities.
“Our work includes working with schools to provide oral health promotion education, signposting families to local NHS dentists and delivering supervised tooth brushing.
“One such project is the Healthy Early Years Award that ensures that childcare settings have policies in place to improve the dental health of children in their care. “
The figures for the Southampton area were better than the overall Hampshire and Isle of Wight Integrated Care Board picture,
Across the county and the island, 36.3 per cent of adults had seen a dentist in the past two years and 48.6 per cent of children had visited in the past 12 months.
Director of dentistry at NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight Integrated Care Board Simon Cooper said: “Since NHS Hampshire and Isle of Wight took over responsibility for NHS dentistry in 2022, we have put a number of measures in place with the aim of increasing availability of NHS dental treatment.
“We know many areas across the country are facing the same difficulties in recruiting dentists to perform NHS dental treatment which is why we have brought in localised changes that make working within the national NHS contract more appealing and a targeted uplift in payments for dental practices.
“There are signs of progress which is great to see, but we know there is still more to do to ensure patients in Southampton can access NHS dental services more regularly.”
Mr Cooper said the integrated care board, which plans services, commissioned temporary additional dentistry treatment at a cost of more than £3.5million.
A mobile dental unit for the most vulnerable patients was launched in February and had performed thousands of treatments, he added.