Local medical card holders facing dental care crisis
3 February 2023
PRESS RELEASE
01.02.23
Local medical card holders facing dental care crisis
Local medical card holders are facing fewer and fewer options when seeking dental care in Louth and Meath, according to Labour TD, Ged Nash.
Following a parliamentary question tabled by Deputy Nash to the Minister for Health, the HSE has provided stark figures of a dwindling dental service for medical card holders in Louth and Meath.
In Louth, the number of dentists registered in the Dental Treatment Services Scheme (DTSS), for medical card holders, has fallen from 28 in 2019 to just 17 at the end of 2022.
In the neighbouring county of Meath, the situation is even worse with the number of dentists participating in the scheme falling from 33 to just eight.
Deputy Ged Nash TD said: “Medical card holders and children are bearing the consequences of a broken system.
“The shocking decline in the number of dentists offering services to local medical card holders cannot be allowed to continue. The government must act now to implement reforms that will bring dentists back to the scheme.”
The local Labour TD has been campaigning for reform of the DTSS for some time and has held meetings with the Irish Dental Association over the issue and continued to press government for change.
“The Irish Dental Association has told me that the HSE has failed to meaningfully engage with its members over the fundamental issues with the DTSS.
“They say that funding for the scheme has failed to keep pace with rising costs and overheads, forcing dentists out of the scheme.”
Deputy Nash added: “In response to my parliamentary question on the issue, the Minister for Health finally admitted recently, that the government accepted that the DTSS needed major reform. That recognition has come late in the day but reform must happen now.
“In fact, my advice from dental professionals is that the situation is going to get worse as the Minister for Health seems intent on ramming through an entirely new scheme that is simply not fit for purpose.
The Labour TD said: “There is a litany of problems that can only be solved by the Department of Health sitting down with the IDA to reform the current scheme.
“On behalf of patients and the dentists frustrated by a failing system, I am calling on the Minister to begin a proper review the scheme in good faith, immediately and to provide additional funding and constructive policy changes to address what is a crisis in dental care and get the DTSS back up to scratch.”
ENDS