Elections will soon be held for seven seats on the Council of the College of General Dentistry, and eligible members are encouraged to consider standing.
The Council is elected by College members to provide leadership and support for the dental professions, and to guide the College Trustees in fulfilling the College’s mission.
It includes representation based both on geographical region and professional role.
Members of the Council serve three-year terms, and elections will shortly take place for the following seats:
Yorkshire and Northern
Central London
Wessex & Oxford
East of Scotland
West & North of Scotland
Overseas representative
National representative
Those elected would be expected to serve from June 2022 – June 2025, and would then be able to stand for re-election. Further seats will be due for election in 2023 and 2024.
Council members are expected to attend three face-to-face meetings each year, which normally take place on a Friday morning in June, October and February, as well as regular online meetings outside of business hours. Those elected this year will be formally inducted at the Council meeting on Friday 24 June in Cardiff.
Members of the Council may serve up to three elected terms (i.e. nine years), and are eligible to stand in the annual election of two Vice Presidents, and the triennial election of a College President.
All Full Members, Associate Fellows and Fellows of the College, regardless of their dental team role, are eligible to nominate themselves as candidates for election to Council.
Candidates for regional seats must live or work within that region, and be registered with that region with CGDent.
Candidates for the National seat must live or work in the UK, and have a registered UK address with CGDent.
Candidates for the Overseas seat must practice dentistry wholly outside the UK, and have a registered overseas address with CGDent.
Associate Members wishing to nominate themselves for election will need to have successfully completed an upgrade to Full Membership before submitting an application.
An online application process, accompanied by a full description of the role, will be published no later than Friday 18 March 2022, and the deadline for submission of applications will be no earlier than Friday 15 April.
A full election timetable will be published in due course; please return to this page over the coming weeks for updates.
The CGDent UK regions map (above) can be downloaded here. Prospective candidates unsure of their CGDent region should contact us here.
The College of General Dentistry has announced that it is offering dental students access to a leading dental e-learning package.
Students who enrol as members of the new College now have access to a growing library of over 350 online training courses and webinar recordings, as well as regular live seminars, through the ProDental platform. ProDental CPD is the UK’s largest independent provider of dental e-learning, serving over 30,000 users with live and on-demand content on their desktop, tablet and mobile devices.
Since its establishment last year as the successor to the Faculty of General Dental Practice, the College has been co-producing webinars with ProDental on subjects of interest to the general dental team, including the College’s guidance and standards publications, the themes explored in its quarterly Primary Dental Journal (PDJ), and events to support its emerging Career Pathways programme for dental professionals.
To date, the College has offered access to these – as well as to ProDental’s 900 hours of additional content, GDC-compliant CPD certification of all learning undertaken, and a bespoke online personal development planning tool (e-PDP) – to its Associate Members, Full Members, Associate Fellows and Fellows from across the dental team.
This access is now available to Student Members of the College. All those undertaking dental education and training in the UK prior to registration are eligible to join the College as Student Members, and a one-off fee of £10 gives membership until the completion of their pre-registration study.
Student Members also get free or discounted access to CGDent events and study days, regular news and events listings from the College, and online access to the PDJ and PDJ Archive, a rich resource of over 1,300 clinical and professional articles from a journal uniquely dedicated to general dental practice.
Dr Abhi Pal, President of the College of General Dentistry, said:
“One of the College’s key missions is to support dental professionals at all stages to progress in their careers. Our new offer for dental students will complement undergraduate studies while also enabling them to look beyond dental school and arrive armed and ready to succeed in the next phase of their professional lives.”
Leading oral health and mental health professionals are calling for greater consideration of the oral health needs of patients with severe mental illness.
The new Right to Smile consensus statement notes that compared to the general population, people experiencing severe mental ill health are less likely to brush their teeth, less likely to access dental services, more likely to have decayed, missing and filled teeth, more likely to lose all of their teeth, more likely to experience gum and supporting bone problems, and are at risk of acute non-psychiatric hospital admission due to tooth decay.
Asserting that there can be no mental health without physical health, and no physical health without oral health, the statement says the oral health inequality for people with severe mental illness is made worse by a lack of effective interventions.
To help close the gap, the authors are calling for improved access to dental services for people with severe mental ill health; greater recognition of their oral health needs in healthcare training, systems and structures; and consideration of oral health in any physical health assessment of a patient with severe mental illness.
Severe mental illnesses are those which can significantly impair someone’s functional activity, and include among others psychosis, schizophrenia, severe depression and bipolar disorder.
Developed by 20 contributors including Vishal Aggarwal FCGDent and Wendy Thompson MCGDent, the statement is jointly published by nine universities, three NHS trusts, the Office of the Chief Dental Officer for England and Australia’s Mindgardens Neuroscience Network.
It is endorsed by the College of General Dentistry, Personalised Care Institute, British Society of Special Care Dentistry, Oral Health Foundation, World Dental Federation and International Centre for Oral Health Inequalities Research & Policy, as well as a number of mental health organisations including the Royal College of Psychiatrists and International Early Psychosis Association.
Update: a blog about this issue, The Right to Smile, which describes how those in general dental practice can contribute to improved oral health outcomes for those with severe mental illness, was published in June 2023.
The new edition of the Primary Dental Journal, Paediatric Dentistry, is now online.
Guest edited by Dr Sanjeev Sood of King’s College London, this issue is dedicated to promoting oral health in children, and outlines strategies for prevention and contemporary management of dental disease in childhood.
It features papers on communicating effectively in a paediatric setting, the dental management of children with haemophilia, and minimally invasive treatments for dentine caries in primary teeth.
Research abstracts: Paediatric dentistry (Ario Santini)
Management of patients with poor prognosis first permanent molars beyond ‘ideal’ timing (Laura Warrilow, Sheridan McDonald)
Parental views on minimally invasive dentistry versus general anaesthesia extractions of children’s compromised first permanent molars: an exploratory qualitative study (Mona Agel, Sasha Scambler, Marie Therese Hosey)
When less is more: minimally invasive, evidence-based treatments for dentine caries in primary teeth – the Hall Technique and silver diamine fluoride (Waraf Al-Yaseen, Nassar Seifo, Shannu Bhatia, Nicola Innes)
An update on the dental management of children with Haemophilia (Ruixiang Yee, Monty S Duggal, Vivian Yung Yee Wong, Joyce Ching Mei Lam)
Replacement resorption in children: the root of all evil? (Laura Warrilow, Tanika Gohil, Abdullah Casaus)
‘Childrenese’: a pilot survey on the choice of language in a paediatric dental setting (Mairead Hennigan, Alice Hamilton, Antoniella Busuttil-Naudi)
Dental bleaching: ‘now I can smile for my selfies’ – paediatric patients’ perspectives (Nabeel Ilyas, Sophie Marshall, Meera Ahluwalia)
As well as the current issue of Primary Dental Journal, CGDent members have free access to the PDJ archive, a rich resource containing over 1,300 informative articles on topics of ongoing relevance to general dental care.
Featuring clinical articles, editorials and updates from the College, the Primary Dental Journal is widely recognised as a leading resource for GDPs and DCPs working in primary care. CGDent membership includes free access to the PDJ, both online and in print – find out more about becoming a member.
CGDent members and PDJ subscribers should expect their printed copies to arrive in the next 2-3 weeks.
Ian Mills has become the first ever recipient of the prestigious College Medal, the highest honour bestowed by the College of General Dentistry (CGDent).
Ian Mills FCGDent
Reserved to no more than one recipient per year, the College Medal succeeds the Faculty Medal, which was previously awarded by the Faculty of General Dental Practice UK (FGDP) to just four individuals. It is conferred for exceptional service of the dental profession and its patients in a manner aligned with the values and mission of the College, and both members and non-members are eligible for consideration.
Dr Mills has received the award in recognition of his considerable contributions to the profession over many years, including through the College and previously the Faculty, in particular his exemplary leadership at the height of the coronavirus pandemic, his pivotal roles in establishing the CGDent and securing the FGDP’s transfer into it last year, and his promotion of greater equality, diversity and inclusion in the dental professions.
Ian qualified as a dentist from Glasgow University in 1987 and spent the early part of his career working in maxillofacial surgery. In 1994 he moved to Devon, and three years later set up Torrington Dental Practice in North Devon, now an eight-surgery mixed NHS-and-private practice, where he continues to work as a partner.
He joined the Faculty the same year, and after completing its prestigious Diploma in Implant Dentistry, gaining Fellowship and becoming a Fellowship Assessor, was elected to the National Faculty Board to represent the South West region. He was later appointed Chair of the Examinations Committee and the Faculty’s representative on the Care Quality Commission Dental Reference Group, and served as Junior Vice Dean from 2016-17 and Senior Vice Dean from 2017-18 before being elected FGDP’s tenth Dean, a post he held from 2018-2021.
During his tenure he represented the profession on a number of committees and working groups, including NHS England’s Advisory Board for Dental Systems Reform, the Joint Committee for Postgraduate Training in Dentistry, the Intercollegiate Advisory Committee on Sedation in Dentistry, the Council of the Scottish Intercollegiate Guidelines Network and the Public Health England group overseeing the development of the fourth edition of Delivering Better Oral Health.
In his first annual speech as Dean, he highlighted the inequality of opportunities for career progression within dentistry, noting in particular the disproportionate number of men in leadership roles relative to the gender balance in the profession, and he later instituted the FGDP-CGDent Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Programme Board.
Early in the pandemic, Ian established a forward planning task group to try to find a way for dental practices to re-open their doors as soon as safely possible. Convening individuals from over 30 organisations to develop suitable guidance, he played a key role in its development, working tirelessly to seek consensus on the many challenges of delivering dental services while minimising the risks of transmission. Completed within the space of just four weeks, Implications of COVID-19 for the safe management of general dental practice was published a week before face-to-face practice resumed in England, giving practices much needed time to prepare when no official re-opening guidance had yet been published. With its in-built responsiveness to varying COVID-19 alert levels, the guidance has remained accessible and relevant over the last 18 months.
Continuously supporting the profession through the pandemic, he led numerous webinars, joined the NHS England working group on the resilience of mixed dental practices, was part of the Scottish Dental Clinical Effectiveness Programme’s AGP Rapid Review Group, facilitated revised guidance on fallow time and steered the development of the Fallow Time Calculator.
Prior to his Deanship, he was an elected member of the British Dental Association’s General Dental Practice Committee, a member of Devon Local Dental Committee, and on the Professional Executive Committee of North Devon Primary Care Trust.
In addition to his clinical practice, Ian has worked at Peninsula Dental School since it was established and has remained closely involved in the undergraduate programme. Currently Associate Professor in Primary Care Dentistry, he was previously a clinical supervisor, group facilitator and honorary lecturer. Actively involved in promoting and developing research in primary dental care, with particular interests in measuring quality outcomes, person-centred care and environmental sustainability, in 2018 he was awarded a PhD for research into person-centred care in general dental practice.
He is an Ambassador, Founder, Fellow and former Trustee of the College of General Dentistry, and has been instrumental in the establishment and progression of its Career Pathways programme. A Fellow of the International College of Dentists, the Higher Education Academy and the Faculty of Dental Surgery of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow, he is a former Trustee of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
The College of General Dentistry and British Association of Dental Nurses (BADN) are warning of a potential catastrophe for dental patients if the planned implementation of mandatory COVID-19 vaccinations for all patient-facing staff in England is not deferred.
Regulations came into effect earlier this month that will make it unlawful from 1 April 2022 for a CQC-regulated employer to deploy staff who are not fully vaccinated to work face-to-face with patients. The rules, which will apply to NHS and private providers alike, will effectively force dental practices to dismiss staff who have not received their first dose of an approved coronavirus vaccine by 3 February, and second dose by 31 March, unless they are clinically exempt, under 18, taking part in a COVID vaccine trial or can be redeployed into a non-patient-facing role.
Both the College and BADN are unequivocal in their encouragement of dental professionals to take up the offer of coronavirus vaccination. However, interim results from the BADN COVID Vaccination Survey, based on the responses of over 1,000 practising dental nurses to date, show that 26% have not yet received two vaccination doses, and 24% will not have been double-vaccinated by the deadline.
Responses to date are similar for both members and non-members of the association. If the findings are representative of the dental nursing profession as a whole – which makes up half the dental workforce – this would suggest an impending reduction in available dental staff in England of up to 12,000, or 12%, plus any dentists, dental therapists, dental hygienists, clinical dental technicians or orthodontic therapists who may not be double-vaccinated.
The survey also found that 32% of respondents so far said they do not intend to take up the offer of a ‘booster’ dose, suggesting that staffing problems will only increase if the definition of ‘fully vaccinated’ is later amended to require three doses.
Dr Abhi Pal, President of the College of General Dentistry, and Jacqui Elsden, President of the British Association of Dental Nurses and an Associate Member of the College, said:
“Dental nurses are a vital part of the team without whom dental care cannot be delivered, and the BADN’s data will only strengthen existing concerns in practices across the country.
“Tens of millions of dental appointments have been missed during the pandemic, but while welcome additional funding has just been announced by NHS England to help tackle the backlog during February and March, losing up to a quarter of dental nurses from 1 April would lead to a precipitous reduction in care provision, quickly reversing any progress made and leaving millions of dental patients once again unable to get the treatment they need. We urge the government to defer implementation of the vaccination requirement for dental employers in order to avert a calamitous own goal.”
Tonight at 7pm, a week ahead of the deadline to take up the first vaccination dose, the College is hosting Vaccination: your questions answered.
Free for all dental professionals to watch live, speakers include Professor Jason Leitch, (Senior Clinical Advisor to the Scottish Government, CGDent Ambassador and regular explainer of all matters COVID in the broadcast media), and Sarah Buxton (HR and Employment Solicitor and legal advisor to the Association of Dental Administrators and Managers and the British Society of Dental Hygiene and Therapy). Register here
Commenting on the announcement that an additional £50m of funding will be provided for NHS dentistry in England over the next ten weeks, Dr Abhi Pal, President of the College of General Dentistry, said:
“New funding for dentistry is to be welcomed, and today’s announcement will provide short-term help to a significant number of people who have struggled to get their oral health needs met during the pandemic, especially children and patients with autism, learning difficulties and severe mental illness.
“However, it is important that longer term underfunding and recruitment problems are also addressed, and the NHS dental contract reformed, as even before the pandemic only half of adults in England were able to access NHS dental care. The College will also be supporting workforce retention through its Career Pathways programme.”
The College of General Dentistry is offering discounted membership fees to dental care professionals, all of whom are now eligible for Associate Membership.
Dental Hygienists, Dental Therapists, Dental Technicians and Clinical Dental Technicians pay only one-third fees for their first year’s membership, meaning those joining as Associate Members pay just £33.
In a pioneering move for a UK dental college, all registered dental professionals are able to apply for Full Membership (MCGDent) if they hold a relevant Postgraduate Certificate or an equivalent qualification, and Dental Hygienists, Dental Therapists, Dental Technicians and Clinical Dental Technicians doing so pay only £94 in their first year.
Those holding a relevant Postgraduate Diploma, Master’s degree or an equivalent qualification are eligible for Associate Fellowship (AssocFCGDent), a new ‘stepping stone’ to Fellowship, and dental team members joining at this grade will pay £117 initially.
The first year’s fee for dental care professionals joining as Fellows (FCGDent) – initially only those awarded an Honorary Fellowship by the College, or previously by the Faculty of General Dental Practice, a UK Royal College or equivalent – is £144.
Dental Nurses and Orthodontic Therapists receive the same two-thirds discounts, at all membership grades, on an ongoing basis.
Dental practice managers, and other non-clinical members of the dental team, can join the College as Affiliate Members for £50 per annum.
The Primary Dental Journal Archive is now up and running, with access for CGDent members fully established.
The Primary Dental Journal (PDJ) is the College of General Dentistry’s quarterly peer-reviewed journal, and with its unique dedication to general dental practice, is widely recognised as a leading resource for all dental professionals working in primary care.
Three themed issues in each annual volume explore topics of interest and relevance to the primary care dental team, led by an invited Guest Editor who is a renowned expert in the field, with one ‘general issue’ per volume covering a wide range of topics.
Published by the Faculty of General Dental Practice until its transfer into the College earlier this year, PDJ was first issued in October 2012, and was preceded by Primary Dental Care.
As well as receiving quarterly printed copies of the latest issues of PDJ, College members now have exclusive online access not only to the full articles in the current issue, but to all past PDJ content and all Primary Dental Care content published this century, a rich resource of over 1,300 articles spanning 23 volumes and 88 issues.
Curated by our publishing partner, SAGE Publishing, the PDJ Archive is an invaluable research tool, offering a wide array of clinical papers of ongoing relevance to general dental care, as well as articles covering a range of professional topics which continue to be discussed and debated.
It offers members access to content which they may not have received in print at the point of publication, and for those who were longstanding members of the FGDP and may prefer to consult their library of print issues, the online search functionality will enable them to quickly identify where to find particular articles.
Members may be interested to note that the College is now co-producing a series of webinars that examine topics covered in recent and imminent issues of PDJ. These are free to view live, with CGDent members also offered a free CPD certificate and free on-demand access to the recordings. Visit our events page for a list of upcoming live webinars and to access recent webinar recordings.
Dr Debbie Reed AssocFCGDent has received the inaugural Janet Goodwin Award, which was conferred last night by Abhi Pal, President of the College of General Dentistry (CGDent), at a reception marking the 80th anniversary of the British Association of Dental Nurses (BADN).
The new award was instituted to recognise achievement by dental care professionals (DCPs) in areas such as leadership, standards of professionalism and patient care, commitment to life-long learning, service to the profession and advocacy for the whole-team approach to general dental care.
A dental nurse, Associate Fellow of CGDent, and accomplished and passionate tutor, Dr Reed is Head of the Department for Digital and Lifelong Learning and the Centre for Professional Practice at the University of Kent, where she developed and runs the Masters in Advanced and Specialist Healthcare (Applied Dental Professional Practice pathway). She received the award in recognition of her extraordinary commitment to her own education, as well as that of others throughout the whole dental team. She completed an educational doctorate in 2019, and has written and contributed to articles on topics such as mentoring, evidence-based practice in dental nursing, and the professional image of dental nurses. The award also recognises her ‘can do’ attitude, her inspiration of others to want to achieve their very best, and her advocacy for DCPs to have the same career opportunities and experiences as dentists. Last year she was awarded the BADN Outstanding Contribution to Dental Nursing Professional Practice Award in recognition for her work with dental nurses.
The award to Dr Reed was announced in April 2021 by the Faculty of General Dental Practice UK (FGDP), which elected not to host a conferral ceremony at the time due to concern over potential coronavirus transmission.
The award honours the legacy of the late Janet Goodwin FFGDP(UK)(Hon.), who throughout her almost 50 years as a dental nurse was a staunch advocate for the advancement and recognition of DCPs.
In a wide-ranging career, Janet worked in general dental practice, community practice, secondary care and healthcare management. She was the first dental nurse to be a member of the General Dental Council, and held a number of other notable posts including Chair of the GDC Standards Review Group and President of the Oral Health Foundation, and was both an Examiner and Chair of the National Examining Board for Dental Nurses. She served the FGDP for many years as a representative for the interests of the wider dental team, and became an Affiliate Member of the Faculty when it opened its membership to DCPs in 2005. An elected member and Chair of the Faculty’s DCP Committee, she sat on the Board for over ten years as an Observer, contributed to many standing committees, provided input during the development of standards and guidance, and was awarded Honorary Fellowship in 2019. She passed away in September 2020 after a long battle with breast cancer.
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