Dental As Anything

Student selection and workforce maldistribution

Seemingly neutral prerequisite subjects and admissions settings systematically disadvantage rural and low socioeconomic status students - a question of fairness that has workforce implications. Have you ever thought about how you were selected into dental school, and whether that process was the best way to select future dentists? Or perhaps more importantly, how that selection process shapes the profession and ultimately plays a role in either improving health outcomes or exacerbating inequities in access to care. Some interesting new evidence looks at how selection criteria for medical school might perpetuate disadvantage, particularly for students from rural areas and lower socioeconomic backgrounds. In this episode of the Dental As Anything podcast I look at some of the evidence that underpins student selection, and talk about ways in which this might contribute to the maldistribution of the dental workforce, particularly from a geographic perspective. Could this then be one of the levers that might help improve access to care in underserved communities? Somecontentious food for thought.

Financial Dentophobia 🦷 💰

In a country gripped by an affordability crisis, what are we doing to ensure that all Australians can access the dental care that they need? Recent news stories have shone a light on dental affordability, with many Australians flocking overseas for major dental treatment. For many Australians, dental care has quietly become a luxury — not a routine service but a decision weighed against rent, food, fuel and other essentials. They avoid the dentist not mainly because they fear the drill — although dental anxiety does play a role — but because the system forces them to choose between essential living costs and essential health care. That’s not choice, that’s constraint. As cost-of-living pressures grow and health inequalities widen, ignoring dental care isn’t a cost-saving strategy; it’s a ticking public health time-bomb. In this episode of the Dental As Anything podcast I talk about our two tiered system that has split Australians into those who can afford routine visits and preventive care to maintain their oral health, and those who are trapped in a cycle of pain, delayed care and costly treatment as a consequence.It’s time we recognised dental health not as a discretionary service but as an integral part of health care worthy of protection, funding, and equality. As a profession we must grapple these issues if we want to build future where all Australians have fair, equitable and affordable access to healthcare. Where prevention is prioritised and valued. And corporate interests and profits – of all sorts – take a back seat to an individuals right to health. Without some reform of our current system, oral health inequities will continue to widen.

The future is now

Discussion on the future of dentistry invariably converges on advances in technology - whether it is new materials or equipment, or the holy grail of growing a new tooth. Things that are designed to make our lives as dentists easier, simpler, faster or more profitable. And obviously deliver better outcomes to patients. One thing that they tend to have in common is that they perpetuate the treatment focus of dentistry. The future of dentistry is apparently about how we treat dental disease in new and innovative ways. There is no reimagining a completely new future that doesn’t revolve around treating dental disease. In this episode of the Dental As Anything podcast I talk aboutsome of the issues confronting the dental profession that we must grapple with if we want to build future where all Australians have fair, equitable and affordable access to healthcare. Where prevention is prioritised and valued. And corporate interests and profits – of all sorts – take a back seat to an individuals right to health.

Suicide and dental practitioners

This podcast discusses suicide and topics that some people may find distressing. If this raises any issues for you crisis support services like Lifeline can be reached 24 hours a day on 13 11 14 A new paper just published in the Journal of the American Dental Association [https://jada.ada.org/article/S0002-8177(25)00498-2/pdf] looked at suicide mortality amongst US dentists between 1979 and 2018. It found that dentists experienced a higher suicide mortality than the general population, and that had increased since 1995. This is a tough topic to discuss, but such an important one, as this recent publication highlights. Dentistry is a stressful profession, and dental practitioners suffer a high burden of psychological distress and mental illness. More broadly, suicide continues to be a significant issue in Australia. Every day nearly nine Australians take their life, and it’s estimated that for every death around 30 people will attempt suicide. When we studied [https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cdoe.12849] the mental health and wellbeing of Australian dental practitioners at the end of 2021, we found that 1 in 6 reported thoughts of suicide in the previous 12 months, with nearly 1 in 3 saying that they had ever thought about taking their own life, and 5.6% reported having previously made an attempt to take their own life. In this episode of the Dental As Anything podcast I unpack some of the findings of this latest study, compare to some of the findings from our Australian research and discuss some strategies that we can all use to tackle the mental health crisis in the dental profession. First and foremost we need to keep having discussions about mental health and wellbeing, and working to remove the stigma that is associated with mental health. Get in the right frame of mind to ask the question, and make sure you leave time to have the conversation. Be prepared if the answer is ‘I’m not okay’ and make sure you are in the right headspace for this response. * Are you ok? * How are you going? * I just wanted to check in and see how you are going? Listen with compassion and empathy, and without judgement. You don’t have to solve their problem, just focus on helping to understand. Don’t interrupt and be prepared to sit in silence – it’s not easy for somone to answer the question and open up about their struggles. Show empathy and let them know that you have heard them. Ask if there is anything that you can do to support them and if they have been seeking professional help. If not, encourage them to see a doctor or other mental health professional, particularly if they have been experiencing significant struggles for more than two weeks. There are also services like: * Lifeline 13 11 14 * Beyond Blue 1300 22 4636 Set a reminder to follow up and see how they are going. Ask if they have sought professional help, and encourage them again if they haven’t. Conversations about mental health can be uncomfortable for everyone. It’s not easy. But it can be life changing. Speaking up is important to save lives. If you’re struggling, it’s also important to speak up and ask for help. It’s not a weakness, it’s a strength. What can we do?Get ReadyAskListenEncourage ActionFollow-up

How accurate was dental workforce modelling?

In 2014 Health Workforce Australia (HWA) released a report on the future oral health workforce. It came amidst claims from the dental profession that we were facing an oversupply of dentists and calls to cap [https://www.smh.com.au/national/many-dentists-but-not-enough-holes-20130111-2clas.html] the number of dental schools and domestic dental graduates, as well as removing dentists from the Skilled Occupation List. The HWA report predicted a persistent workforce oversupply until at least 2025, projecting that we would have 19,624 dentists and dental specialists working clinically in Australia. In this episode of the Dental As Anything podcast I drill down into the Health Workforce Australia modelling to see whether their workforce predictions were correct [narrator – they were not], and take a more detailed look at the maldistribution of the dentist workforce over the past decade. Click here [https://matthopcraft.substack.com/p/how-accurate-is-dental-workforce] for the charts show the change in the number of dentists (including dental specialists) per 100,000 people by Local Government Area, broken down into Major Cities, Inner Regional and Outer Regional that are mentioned in this episode.