Future oral and dental workforce for England (2018)

The Dental Workforce Advisory Group (DWAG) convened during 2015-2017 to consider the workforce that would best meet future oral health needs.  This exercise brought together stakeholders from across dentistry to consider the current workforce, the drivers for change, and the principles that should underpin workforce development. The report was compiled and reviewed by DWAG in 2018.

The Final DWAG report, “The Future Oral and Dental Workforce for England,” published below, sets out recommendations for delivering a workforce that will provide timely, prevention-oriented high quality care, in a co-ordinated system.  The Report takes a life-course perspective, considering patient needs at each stage of life:

a) Starting well from birth

b) Keeping well through school years

c) Maintaining well through adult life, and

d) Sustaining well into older age to end well

The DWAG’s research and findings will feed into and underpin HEE’s activities, as we take forward a programme of evidence-gathering, engagement and dental education reform options through the Advancing Dental Care Review.