GPs will NOT commission dentistry

Andrew Lansley, Secretary of State for Health has announced his White Paper for England, Liberating the NHS. Despite persistent rumours that all commissioning would pass from primary care trusts, dentistry will be passed to a central ‘NHS Commissioning Board’. This will not be fully established until April 2012.   The White Paper is light on detail and further implementation papers are promised in the near future. It is reported that GDPC Chair, John Milne, is meeting minister Earl Howe on Tuesday 13th July to discuss future developments in dentistry. The White Paper gave no indication of how Community or Hospital dental services would be affected nor when the change-over from local contracts to a national contract would take place. For the White Paper click here