By JONATHAN FINE
You might remember The Dentists on ITV a year ago – it went behind the scenes of the University Dental Hospital of Manchester, showing horrific full mouth clearances in six year olds. It must have made compelling viewing because coverage of dentistry hasn’t let up since.
Then in April it was Drills, dentures and dentistry: An oral history where we saw how over the past five centuries, dentistry has been transformed from a backstreet horror show into a modern science.
This month the pace quickened with The Truth About Your Teeth, two shows that made British dentists frankly look like miracle workers.
A week ago we had a deluge of ‘greedy dentists’ stories in the Press following the Which? report into NHS dentistry – admittedly, not ideal, most of them. Although the Mail did subsequently publish a rebuttal by an NHS dentist.
But more complimentary stories have followed, such as Gillian Tett’s reflection on the rise of orthodontics and its social implications in the Financial Times – worth a read.
Dentistry is clearly becoming a matter of mainstream public consciousness and combined with the sector’s conspicuous growth – four or fives times faster than the economy at large, it can’t be a bad time to be a dentist, can it?
Best wishes
JJF
jonathan.fine@breathebusiness.co.uk