Scotland’s new CDO to visit health boards
Gillian Leslie will meet Directors of Dentistry, Dental Practice Advisors and board representatives to discuss local issues, innovations and successes.
Gillian Leslie, Scotland’s new Chief Dental Officer (CDO), is planning to visit the nation’s 14 health board areas in the run up to the Scottish parliamentary election in May.
In a letter to the NHS boards, the CDO said she will meet local Directors of Dentistry, Dental Practice Advisors and representatives of the boards “to discuss local issues, innovations and successes.”
“This will allow me and the CDO team to gather information on local issues within the General and Public Dental Services, both to inform our work as well as to support the briefing of incoming government ministers on dental matters from across the sector,” she said.
In her letter, the CDO also welcomed two new interim deputy CDOs, Morag Muir and Kate Wiseman.
Ms Muir is a Consultant in Dental Public Health in NHS Forth Valley and Mis Wiseman is an Assistant Clinical Director in NHS Greater Glasgow & Clyde’s Public Dental Service. They will join Gavin McLellan, who continues in his role as Deputy CDO.
“I think that between us all, this newly formed clinical team represents a broad range of experience from across the dental sector and I look forward to working with them,” said the CDO.
She also highlighted that secondary legislation had been laid down to bring in changes to Prior Approval and the listing process for Mandatory Training.
“While both are in continued development and negotiation with BDA Scotland, I am keen to share our overall intention for these policy changes with you now and I will keep you up to date with these changes as soon as I am able to do so,” she said.
She said the intention for reform of Prior Approval is to move away from a financial limit to a clinical risk trigger, particularly focused on items such as crowns, bridges, endodontic treatment and/or a combination of these items.
Items which currently cause the financial limit to be reached and trigger a Prior Approval requirement – such as dentures, sedation and multiple extractions – will be removed once the changes are in force, anticipated to be from 1 November.
For Mandatory Training, while all dentists entering Scotland will still be required to complete a course of Mandatory Training, the CDO said that Boards will be able to provisionally list GDC-registered dentists where their intended start date falls between the quarterly courses offered by NHS Education for Scotland. If the provisional listee does not subsequently complete or pass the training within six months of their initial listing, they will be delisted.
This listing change will come in to force on 31 January and is expected to support rural recruitment in particular, through the provision of flexibility in terms of course attendance.
“I hope that the initial detail of these changes is welcome to you, and I will issue further detail on both Prior Approval and changes to listing arrangements for Mandatory Training later on this month, once the necessary consultations have concluded, she said.
“In the meantime, I would like to again express my profound thanks to all of you, the dental teams, who continue to deliver care and treatment day in and day out to the people of Scotland.”