 Faces for the Future, the 15th Conference for Dental Care Professionals, took place at the RCSEd on 5 March
This year’s event attracted over 100 dental care practitioners from across the spectrum of dental practice. Starting off, Dr Toby Gilgrass, Consultant Cleft Orthodontist in Glasgow Dental Hospital and School, gave an account of how care for patients with cleft lip and palate in Scotland has changed over the last 15 years. He emphasised the importance of a multidisciplinary team in the care of these patients and explained different roles within the dental team.
In his update on caries management, Professor Chris Deery, from Sheffield’s Department of Paediatric Dentistry, highlighted motivational interviewing as a way to find out what the patient wants for treatment. He considered various techniques and products including the use of tooth mousse in prevention, which is a lactose-free product. He commented on the need for pulpotomies and the debate around pulpotomies and indirect pulp-capping with the view that pulpotomies were now unnecessary.
Dr Donald Thomson, Consultant Radiologist in Dundee Dental Hospital, provided a core CPD update on IR(ME)R. Dr Thomson is very experienced in providing core CPD and has a talent for making difficult topics informative and interesting. His discussion on the effects of radiation and the comparative doses between dental and other radiological investigations was very useful, particularly in the event of patients asking for more information.
Ms Pauline Watt, Dental Hygienist with Lothian Health Board, spoke about Scotland’s Childsmile Programme – a preventive initiative, with the use of fluoride applied by specifically trained dental nurses, which is having a very successful impact in reducing caries in children.
Facial aesthetics and surgery was covered by Mr Mark Devlin and Mr Jeff Downie, consultant maxillofacial surgeons at the Southern General Hospital, Glasgow. This double act showed the merits of working together, and was a superb way to end a good conference. At the end, what we thought was a long queue for additional questions, was instead a long queue of delegates asking for advice on what could be done to improve their own imperfections!
The 16th Conference for Dental Care Professionals will be held on Saturday 3 March 2012.
Susan M Winning, Director DCP School Glasgow
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Other DCP news
Second outing for Cardiff conference
In May, the RCSEd collaborated with the Postgraduate Dental Deanery of Wales to deliver the second DCP conference at Cardiff’s Hilton Hotel. First speaker David Thomas, Acting Chief Dental Officer for Wales, explained to the 300 delegates what HTM 01-05 meant for Wales and stressed the differences between England and Wales.
Dental technician Anthony Telford looked at available dental materials, both in the surgery and in the dental laboratory, and also discussed technical processes in casting metals and porcelain crown fabrication.
Implant complications and their management received attention from Ewen McColl, who focused on the team approach and engaged with all DCP disciplines in his presentation.
Next, dentistry in Afghanistan was covered by Brian Smith and Lesley Hayley, both members of the Royal Naval Dental Services, who described their experience of mass-casualty situations.
Finally, Leo Briggs rounded an interesting day on Law and Ethics in Dentistry, which is always beneficial to the dental team if only as a reminder of what can go wrong.
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