A Dental School for Every City – Lincoln Joins the Club
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- Published: Monday, 09 June 2025 08:14
- Written by Peter Ingle
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Complain to many politicians that you have a leaky bucket and they will promise to increase the water pressure. Further evidence of this mentality comes from Lincoln with the announcement that The University of Lincoln has been granted funding of £1.5m to establish a facility to run courses in dental hygiene and therapy.
That, is just the start though, with Vice Chancellor Prof Neal Juster saying it was, "a first step towards training dentists themselves".
The funding has been approved by the Greater Lincolnshire Combined County Authority (GLCCA), with recently elected Reform party Mayor, Andrea Jenkyns, saying the award was, "great news for residents". When it opens in September 2026 the new Lincolnshire Institute of Dental and Oral Health will be part of the University’s Medical School.
The facility will accept around 30 students in its first year and will teach a new BSc in Dental Hygiene and Therapy alongside a foundation course designed to help dental nurses and other healthcare professionals retrain and upskill.
Prof Juster said the county was "known as a dental desert" and he hoped to get to a full dental school training dentists one day.
The funding has come from the government’s Shared Prosperity Fund which was handed to the GLCCA to distribute. Meeting for the first time since last month’s local elections, and chaired by the Mayor, it voted unanimously to award the money. Dame Andrea who had recommended that funding was approved said she was, "really pleased to get this project off the ground".
According to a 2023 survey by Healthwatch, 45% of Lincolnshire residents have no access to an NHS dentist.
At £1.5 million, no doubt, the project is seen as something of a bargain by its supporters. It will create jobs at the university, bring in tuition fees and is already garnering positive headlines.
The announcement comes a month after GDC figures showed a near 25% increase in the numbers of therapists joining the register in a single year. Across the UK various other MP’s and leaders in dental deserts are also calling for their own local dental school as an answer to the access crisis. While Lincolnshire does have one high profile practice that has made a success of skill mix, there must be questions about how many more therapists there is likely to be work for.
In the absence of NHS contract changes, an honest conversation about the scope and availability of NHS care, or finding a few billion pounds tucked under the cushion in a DHSC sofa, a glut of unemployed therapists may not be the silver bullet Dame Andrea and Professor Juster think it is.
How many "UDAs"
As has been said before, where will they work, and how many under NHS?That would be 33,000 UDA at £45 in general dentistry, and there would be takers I feel, in practices and ready to go.
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