Sir, I am 64 years old and have been managing two part time single handed practices for 15 years. I closed one practice just before the new contract came into existence hoping to find part time work elsewhere. I have been applying everywhere and getting the reply that there are no funds for expansion and also no patients. In three practices in which I work, I am reduced to working half a day in each.

The patients are told that only one item of treatment can be done for one band of charge. Children and exempt patients are also turned away if they are unable to pay. I believe that in the not very distant future we will see a marked deterioration of oral health among the less well off population, many thriving dental practices will struggle and there will also be loss of goodwill between dentists and patients. The success of this dental contract is all but in the imagination of the chief dental officer and his paymasters.