Dental Visits Up In North Suffolk, But More Needs To Be Done
Health bosses have urged people in North Suffolk to register with an NHS dentist, despite recent figures suggesting an increase in patient numbers in the area.
Figures from the Suffolk Primary Care Trust indicate an increase in the number of people seeing a dentist in the county, yet health bosses are still concerned that not enough people are seeing a dentist on a regular basis. According to the latest figures, 58.52 per cent of the county’s population saw a dentist in the last month, which is significantly higher than the figure of 54.19 per cent for July 2009.
Health bosses are particularly concerned about oral health among children, with more and more dentists seeing very young children with decay and gum disease. Dentists are treating children as young as three years old for decay and have called for parents to make use of the NHS services available to them; dental care is free of charge for children.
Fiona Theadom, senior primary care manager at NHS Suffolk, said that figures “were going in the right direction” but more people need to sign up with an NHS dentist. Currently, there are many people who are not bothering to look into services because they assume that no practices in their local area are taking on new patients, but this is not the case and there are places available across the county.
Ms Theadom added that the trust has been advertising NHS services and piggy-backing national campaigns to try and encourage more people to register with an NHS dentist.
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