Muddling through

Speaking at the Health and Care Innovation Expo on March 3, Sir David Nicholson, outgoing chief executive of NHS England said the NHS will be condemned to a ‘managed decline’ without radical change. He added: “Those who say we can muddle through for two or three years as we are and sustain the NHS are wrong.”

Two or three years? Dentistry has been muddling along ever since the full impact of an ineptly designed contract became apparent in 2006. And it looks likely to be muddling along for at least Sir David’s timeframe.

At the Dentistry Show, a Department of Health spokesperson said candidly that to expect a ‘great new system’ in 2015 was not on the cards, and that implementation was a ‘little way in the future’. So much then for those who believed that we were on the cusp of transformational change in dentistry. Are we sleepwalking into a period where detail is more important than outcomes? While no-one, least of all the professions, would wish to see the kind of scramble that took place in the months leading up to April 2006, there needs to be a greater sense of urgency.