Family friendly dental practice

Introduction

Salford has one of the worst rates for children’s tooth extractions in Greater Manchester with 51% of five year olds in the city having tooth decay. There are a number of reasons for, with the most common one being that many children are not attending the dentist for regular check-ups.

Salford’s Start Well Communication Group, a collaboration of organisations including NHS Salford Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and Salford City Council, have launched the new scheme to help tackle the issue.

Salford CCG recently engaged with Salford parents and asked them what the barriers were to taking their children to the dentist, with the most common reasons given were fear (both parent and child), a lack of convenient appointment times and parents and their children not being able to register at the same dental practice.

We also spoke to local children and asked them what dental practices could do to make a visit to the dentist less frightening and the number one response was “make the rooms nicer”. When we asked the children what they meant by this, they said they like to see more pictures, have music playing in the treatment room and toys and things to do to take their minds off going in the dentist’s chair.

Working with a local dental practice we’ve developed some simple pledges and are asking all dentist across Salford to sign up to this FREE scheme.

The pledge

• Make at least one treatment room child friendly
• Allow all family members to register with your practice, to make it less hassle to attend
• Provide some evening and school holiday appointments, to avoid parents having to take their children out of school
• Organise an annual ‘open day’ for families to have a look around the practice

In return, dental practices will receive a welcome pack which includes artwork created by local children, ‘top tips for looking after your teeth’ display boards and children’s stickers.

In return, dental practices will receive a welcome pack which includes artwork created by local children, ‘top tips for looking after your teeth’ display boards and children’s stickers. Please note: packs are limited and are available on a first come first served basis.

Dentists signed up to the scheme (by neighbourhood)

Is your dentist part of the Family friendly dental practice scheme?

If you are a dental practice in Salford and would like to sign up to the scheme, please telephone 0161 212 6278 or email SALCCG.involve@nhs.net.  

Please note:

For urgent in hours (8am to 10pm 7 days a week) dental care please contact 0333 332 3800.

For urgent out of hours dental care please call NHS 111.

Further information

• Find a Salford dentist
• More information about taking care of your teeth and gums
• Find out more information about sugar and fun ideas to help your kids stay healthy (Change4Life)
• Learn more about how health organisations across Salford are working to imrove children’s teeth (Baby teeth do matter)