Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what estimate he has made of adequacy of dental provision for people who are considered housebound; and what assessment he has made of the effect of the covid-19 outbreak on the provision of domiciliary dental services.

NHS England is responsible for commissioning primary care dental services, including domiciliary services. Domiciliary dental services may be delivered by any dentist holding a contract to deliver general dental services or may be specifically commissioned by NHS England locally as an additional service.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, remote triage is being used to assess patients requiring domiciliary treatment, prioritising those requiring urgent dental treatment that cannot be managed remotely. Due to the Infection Prevention and Control measures required, face to face interventions require significant planning, particularly for patients in shared care settings. Therefore, risk assessments and remote triage are vital to ensure that patient outcomes are not compromised considering the high community prevalence of COVID-19. The regional NHS England and NHS Improvement commissioning team will continue to monitor and review domiciliary provision as part of the wider recovery and restoration of services planning.