Parliamentary news from Health Department Commons and Lords
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- Published: Tuesday, 13 February 2018 07:38
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The Department of Health and Social Care has announced ministerial responsibilities following the reshuffle. Junior minister, Steve Brine, MP for Winchester retains the dentistry portfolio. In the Commons questions were asked by MPs Liz McInnes, Diana Johnson and Tim Farron. In the Lords there was a short debate on fluoridation.
Liz McInnes, Labour MP for Heywood and Middleton asked what guidance the Department gave to dental practices on the promotion of private tooth-whitening procedures in their surgeries.
Minister, Steve Brine MP, replied that only treatments that are clinically necessary are provided on the NHS so tooth whitening can only usually be provided privately. No specific guidance is therefore issued on tooth whitening. He continued: “As with any other dental cosmetic procedure practices are able to advertise and offer this service to patients privately. Dentists are required to make clear to patients what treatments are being provided on the NHS and privately and the costs, risks and benefits associated with each. Dentists’ clinical practice is regulated by the General Dental Council. This includes cosmetic procedures such as tooth whitening as well as treatments that are clinically necessary.”
Diana R Johnson, Labour MP for Kingston upon Hull North, asked how many times the Secretary of State had met CDO (England).
Minister, Steve Brine MP, replied that Jeremy Hunt had not met the Chief Dental Officer, who the Minister said provides advice to NHS England, Health Education England and the Department. He continued: “Where advice directly to Ministers is required from any of the professional Chief Officers it is usual for this to be requested by the minister with portfolio responsibility for that policy area and this is the case for dentistry. The Chief Dental Officer has met Ministers with portfolio responsibility for dentistry on a number of occasions.”
Tim Farron, Lib Dem MP for Westmoreland and Lonsdale, asked an= number of questions to how many adults and children were registered with a dentist in his constituency, how many were on waiting lists and for how long.
Minister, Steve Brine MP, replied that patients do not have to register to receive NHS dental treatment and therefore no data was available on the number or proportion of patients registered with a dentist. Information on patients who may be on local waiting lists is not held centrally. He concluded: “Primary care dentistry is commissioned by NHS England which has a legal duty to commission services to meet local need.
House of Lords
Lord Colwyn told the House that dental care would be improved by the addition of fluoride to the water supply. He said: “This has been agreed by the minister) and his department, but not all water authorities are prepared to take this step.
Replying, minister Lord O'Shaughnessy said they had talked about fluoridation a lot in this House recently. It is up for local areas to come forward with proposals.
Lord Hunt of Kings Heath said the House had not quite talked enough, because the problem is this: fluoridation would deal with a lot of the areas with high numbers of oral health issues. The local authority is responsible for this and for paying the revenue costs, but the benefit falls to the health service. The cost annually for an average local authority is £300,000.
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