Utilising the dental workforce in England, United Kingdom, to optimise the response to COVID-19

Abstract

COVID-19 presents a unique and significant challenge to healthcare systems across the globe. Dental workforce redeployment, in England, during the response to Coronavirus (COVID-19), is the first reported national effort to redeploy a professional body into new clinical environments. The policy decision to facilitate redeployment of the dental workforce, in March 2020, by the Office of the Chief Dental Officer (OCDO), increased flexibility within workforce systems and allowed increasing demand on healthcare services to be managed safely and effectively. This paper outlines how this policy change was achieved via a multi-professional approach, mapping competencies of the dental workforce to high-priority areas of healthcare need. The dental workforce has a varied and often specialised skill set, offering expertise in infection prevention and control, airway management and often, behaviour management. These skills can be an important contribution to tackling a pandemic where expertise in these areas is vital. This increase in workforce supply allows healthcare systems to improve their surge response capabilities. Additionally, redeployment presents an opportunity to create greater and sustained collaboration between the medical and dental professions, leading to greater understanding of the contribution of oral health to wider medical wellbeing.