David Eyre Politics Show Scotland

There has been little increase in Scotland's dental cover

A six year old boy from the Western Isles had to travel to Glasgow for emergency dental work, as there was no local dentists available.

His parents had to shell out over �200 to get him to Glasgow, and that did not include the cost of the dental work.

That was carried out privately.

The shortage of NHS dentists across all of Scotland, not just in rural areas, remains acute.

Other problems came to a head when dentist Kenny Jones opened a practice in Stonehaven, Aberdeenshire, and was besieged by 1,500 prospective patients.

Further out in the Western Isles, residents face a trip to the mainland if they get a toothache after the only dental practice on Lewis closed its doors.

Executive action?

The Scottish Executive has promised to turn things around and pointed out a number of additional services already set up through the Primary Care Modernisation Fund.

Measures include:

• new walk-in treatment centre in Edinburgh
• improved emergency access in Tayside, Caithness and Sutherland
• dedicated new facility in Orkney
• extensions to primary care facilities in Highland to accommodate dentistry
• dental outreach training initiatives in Greater Glasgow, Renfrew and Inverclyde

The funding move follows increasing reports of dentists deregistering patients and increasing private work, a shortage of dentists willing to work in rural areas and increasing pressure on hospital dental services to pick up emergency cases normally seen by the GP.

New initiative

In a separate development this week, the Scottish Executive is planning to give people over 60-years-old free dental checks.

This will commence in 2006, with the rest of the population being entitled to free dental checks the following year.

All very well, but how is this going to be possible?

With such a recruitment and retention problem at the minute, Politics Show tries to discover how these ambitious plans will be met.

Politics Show

Politics Show - looking at the issues which hit the headlines.

Tune into Politics Show Scotland, on BBC One this Sunday at 12.30pm, with reporter David Eyre and presenter Glenn Campbell

Let us know what you think.

Disclaimer: The BBC may edit your comments and cannot guarantee that all emails will be published.