When we rang in the New Year this year, many of us will have reflected on how time had flown since we were celebrating the new Millennium (unless you're a spring chicken!). Nobody knew what a strange and alien year 2020 would turn out to be.

Every member of the dental team will have had different experiences of the pandemic and lockdown, but I think all of us will remember vividly how we spent this period for many years to come.

One group with extremely contrasting experiences is dental nurses; as dental journalist Caroline Holland puts it, dental nurses' experiences have ranged from 'heroism to hardship'. In her news story Caroline points out that 'more dental nurses were redeployed into the wider NHS during April and May than any other dental group and their efforts were heroic'. In the cover story this June, we hear about dental nurses such as Jo Wrigley, who was asked to work in family liaison on an end-of-life ward, and Paige Holdaway, who moved to intensive care to assist patients on ventilators.

However, other dental nurses have found themselves at a disadvantage during lockdown, or even poorly treated by their employers.

I hope that your career in dentistry has not been overshadowed by your circumstances during lockdown, and that you can all return to work soon and enjoy being back with your teams and patients.

Besides highlighting dental nurses' situations, this issue looks at the dento-legal questions you might have upon returning to work; and what you might do to prepare to return, if you have not done so already (advice from the BSDHT). We present original articles on the oral considerations of patients with lip fillers and an audit on whether dental professionals provide smoking cessation advice, and look at the daily life of a young dental nurse who only qualified in March this year.

If you have returned to work, I would love to hear about how it is going and the arrangements that your practice have made to keep staff and patients safe as you reopen your doors.

Good luck everyone.

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Kate Quinlan

Editor

k.quinlan@nature.com