‘It is time that we fully rethink what we expect of dentistry and who performs it’ 

• IT has long intrigued me as to the curious demarcation in matters surgical between dentistry and other conditions requiring medical intervention and the manner in which dental treatment is handled by the health services, (Dental services have been the Cinderella services for too long, July 29).

Before to the founding of the National Health Service in 1948 many suffered poor dentition for their entire lives. And not just the poor.

Notwithstanding the expertise of dentists, it does seem that there has long been a desire to separate “cosmetic” from “mainstream” dentistry and, as a result, who is responsible for paying for it.

It seems bizarre that dentistry is conducted in conditions nearer to that of a hairdresser in an armchair in the back room of a shop than any other surgery which would merit a hospital operating theatre.

Given the origins of barber-surgeons – and the striped-pole signage – this is perhaps not entirely coincidental.

For many people dental work, while conscious or part-conscious, is at best an ordeal. And it cannot be easy for dentists who must perform skilled and precise work on patients who are struggling to remain still and breathe easily.

It is also easy to sympathise with dentists for whom NHS rates are obviously far from lavish.

If, as we are told so often, good dental health is such a key part of our health as a whole, why is it not treated as simply part of the full range of NHS in-hospital services and performed under conditions required of other surgical procedures.

The arcane complexity of the charging system, and what merits the status of “deserving” work or luxury “cosmetic” work, can be hard to differentiate.

It is time that we fully rethink what we expect of dentistry and who performs it.

While many may wish to have complex private treatment, and be happy to pay whatever they want, most want competent dental work performed in a trusted NHS facility; and do not wish to be conscious while it is done any more than they would want to watch while their appendix is removed.

JON TEMPLE
Address supplied