Ageing Dental Academic Cohort Threatens Workforce Planning
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- Published: Monday, 22 April 2024 09:59
- Written by Guy Tuggle
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The effectiveness of the NHS’s Long Term Workforce Plan (LWP) and government’s Dental Recovery Plan (DRP) could be compromised by the ageing team of academics to train the clinical teams of the future.
New data published by the Dental Schools Council *(DSC) has revealed that a quarter of the clinical academic workforce is aged 55 or over. 57% of professors are over 55. In 2004 the figure was just 31%.
Clinical academics (CAs) are health professionals who undertake teaching and research alongside treating patients in the NHS. A large proportion of clinical skills education is undertaken by these staff who are often responsible for course design, leadership and delivery as well as contributing to NHS dental services.
The NHS LWP government aims to ’build a pipeline of new dentists for the future by expanding dental undergraduate training places by 40% to more than 1,100 per year by 2031 to 2032, with an initial 24% increase to 1,000 places by 2028 to 2029’.
’As these academics near retirement, if the pipeline of Clinical Academics is not maintained, delivering the ambitions of the Long Term Workforce Plan becomes far more challenging’ a DSC statement said .
’The impact is not limited to education’ it continued, ’as a decline in the CA workforce will have an impact on dental research which provides the evidence base for improved clinical practice’.
The DSC survey noted some regional differences. ’Dental General Practice has doubled since 2014, and there have been increases in the number of clinical academics in Northern Ireland, South West and the North East.
However, during the same period, there has been a decline in Wales, North West and the West Midlands with the latter experiencing a 42% drop since a decade ago’.
To support the growth of clinical academia it is important that academics have access to local Clinical Excellence Awards and are appropriately recognised through the National Clinical Impact Award scheme which has replaced the previous national scheme.
The proportion of dental academics holding an award is decreasing, only 5% of clinical academics held an award in 2023 compared to 14% in 2014. Greater promotion and understanding of the career are also needed.
In response to this, the Clinical Academic Training and Careers Hub (CATCH) was launched in October 2021 to promote the role of clinical academics and support health professionals beginning their clinical academic journey.
Professor Kirsty Hill, Chair of the Dental Schools Council said: “NHS dentistry needs reform and expanding the number of undergraduate oral healthcare students is part of that much needed recovery. This growth will require more staff to train those students and clinical academics are essential to delivering that education. The data show us that the academic workforce is ageing and as we look to future proof how we deliver dental care, now is the time to invest in clinical academia as part of the government’s plans to recover and reform NHS dentistry. This includes providing adequate support and funding to early career clinical academics so that we have sufficient staff to replace the potential loss of expertise that may soon be retiring. Including clinical academics in discussions on contractual reform is also essential to ensuring academia is viewed as a valuable and rewarding career path."
* The Dental Schools Council is the authoritative voice of the dental schools within universities across the United Kingdom and Ireland. For information about the work of the Dental Schools Council, please see dentalschoolscouncil.ac.uk. The data collected on dental clinical academic staffing levels includes data from UK dental schools only.
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