Norfolk and Waveney dental underspend third worst in country

New figures show that 27pc of Norfolk and Waveney's allocated NHS dental funding - a total of £17m - is not being used this year.

This is despite the region having the worst dental care in the country, with just one NHS dentist for every 2,776 patients, and rising levels of associated health problems.

Research by the Health Service Journal shows that Norfolk and Waveney have the third highest rate of unspent dental cash in the country.

Health bosses say such underspends can occur for a number of reasons, including when private practices hand back their NHS contracts or when there are simply no dentists available to do the work.

But Norfolk MPs who have campaigned for improved dental care said it was "astonishing" that the cash was not being used this year to help solve the problems.

Clive Lewis, Labour MP for Norwich South, said: "We've got the most profound dental crisis in the country, so why is this cash still going begging?

"It is partly because of the outdated and increasingly unfulfillable demands the government makes of local dental practices - and also because we don't have enough dentists in the county."

Duncan Baker, Conservative MP for North Norfolk, said the underspend should be used to "turbo-charge bringing NHS dentists to Norfolk" by offering 'golden hellos' to bring more to the region.

He said: "We should be taking this underspend and doing whatever we can to incentivise people to take up NHS dental work in Norfolk.

"There are metropolitan places like Manchester and Leeds where there is a plethora of NHS dentists.

"We need to be saying to these people if they come to Norfolk they can have golden hellos. Clearly, the money is there to do this."

Currently, the only areas in the country where a higher percentage of dental budgets are expected to go unspent are Lincolnshire (30pc) and Hampshire (29pc).

In other charts, of poor dental care, the region comes top. Norfolk and Waveney has the country's largest ratio of dentists to patients, making it the worst 'dental desert'.

Other statistics show that more than 1,000 people in the last year had to attend Norfolk's A&E departments for dental care because their health issues were so serious.

Meanwhile, Norfolk's five-year-olds have the highest prevalence of dental decay in the east of England with the King's Lynn and west Norfolk area among the worst affected in the country.

When a new dentist opened in North Walsham last week, it received more than 3,000 appointment requests by the end of its first day, even though it has yet to say whether it will accept new NHS adult patients.

Local NHS bosses say efforts are being made to address the shortages.

A spokesman for NHS Norfolk and Waveney said: "We don't have the level of NHS-provided dental services we need in Norfolk and Waveney and we have been working hard since we took over responsibility for commissioning on April 1 2023 to increase availability - including recruiting 14 new dentists since then.

"We are investing as much of the dental budget as we can to support delivery of new dental services.

"Where provision exists to reinvest dental contract-related surplus back into dental services, such as through contract values being reduced or contract handbacks, we are doing so."

"We have rapidly implemented a number of initiatives to help improve services while we work on our longer-term plans, including an urgent treatment service and a children and young people's oral health prevention initiative."

Norfolk and Waveney's underspend comes as part of a national trend, with £400m expected to be untouched across the NHS.

It comes despite Westminster having this month unveiled a new 'recovery plan' to address shortages in NHS dentistry in the UK.

Meanwhile, calls for a new dental college to be set up at the UEA are continuing to gather pace.

Earlier this year, every MP in the region put their names to pleas for the University of East Anglia to receive funding to establish the course.