Dental Working Patterns Survey 2022/23 Guidance Notes for Northern Ireland

Your GDC Number is requested at the start of the survey to allow NHS England to link your responses to the dental workforce dataset. This dataset is then shared with HMRC who match this data with tax returns and provide NHS England with aggregated non-identifiable data that is used to create the Dental Earnings and Expenses Estimates publication. The information gathered from the survey provides additional valuable insight into earnings by working hours, business arrangement and time spent on NHS dentistry, which are used by the commissioners of the survey as well as by DDRB.

For the purposes of this survey primary care dentistry in Northern Ireland is defined as primary care dental treatment performed by dentists holding a Dental List DS number or working as an assistant under another DS number. Such treatment may be performed in high street dental practices under General Dental Services (GDS) regulations; in dental practices under Pilot Personal Dental Services directions; or under specific Salaried Dental Service arrangements with the Health and Social Care Board (HSCB). Primary care dentistry consists of Health Service and private work and can occur in more than one practice.

Note that primary care dentistry includes time spent on relevant non-clinical work (which can include administrative and management duties) and can also involve orthodontic work, domiciliary care or dentistry performed on referral.

It does not include secondary care, time spent working for a post-graduate deanery or in dental school.

Please include the number of months you worked as a primary care dentist (as defined above); during these months you may have taken holidays, or performed secondary dental care as well. Please note that any extended period of continuous absence of one month or more (for example maternity/sickness leave) should be excluded.

If you were working in a primary care dental practice for 12 months, and also working in a hospital part time for part of the year, you would mark down 12 months in the box provided.

If you worked only 2 days per week as a primary care dentist, but did so for the entire year, you would mark down 12 months in the box provided.

For the purpose of answering this survey, clinical work is defined as all face-to-face contact with patients (including preventative care).

Only include annual leave as time away from dentistry; this does not include time away from dentistry due to extenuating circumstances (such as sickness, maternity leave, compassionate reasons etc.), nor does it include time away for continuing professional development (CPD).

Please see Annex A for detailed descriptions of each dental type (health service working arrangement).

Example A

The dentist is an owner of one dental practice, has an arrangement with the Health and Social Care Board (HSCB), and therefore holds a DS number, and provides general dental services (GDS) within the practice. This dentist would answer Question 6 as below. 

The dentist is an owner of one dental practice, has an arrangement with the HSCB and provides general dental services within the practice. The dentist also provides general dental services in the practice of another dentist (as an associate). This dentist would answer Question 6 as shown below. Please note, if the dentist switched arrangements in the year, becoming a Practice Owner/Director/Partner after being an Associate only (or vice versa), they would answer in the same way.

The dentist works for their own limited company or limited liability partnership. In EITHER case, the company/partnership has an associate arrangement with a practice owner and performs dentistry on their behalf (the dentist also has an arrangement with the HSCB to provide general dental services). This dentist would answer Question 6 as below:

Practice Owner/director/partner dentists who hold an arrangement or arrangements with a Health and Social Care Board (HSCB), and therefore have a DS number, can choose to run their businesses under a number of different arrangements.

For each contract that you hold where you are the practice owner/director/partner, please indicate the business arrangement in the table provided.

Associated – Incorporated dentists work for their own body corporate which is responsible for performing dentistry of another practice owner/director/partner or other limited company, hold a DS number, and also perform primary care dental services. Please indicate the business arrangement (Limited Company or Limited Liability Partnership) in the table provided.

See Annex A for detailed descriptions of each business arrangement.

Example A

A dentist does not personally hold a contract with the HSCB but is an owner/director/ partner of a limited company, and this limited company holds a contract with a HSCB. This dentist would answer question 7/15 as below:

A dentist holds a total of three contracts with HSCBs. For two of these contracts, the dentist is involved in limited liability partnerships; for the other the dentist is a sole trader but has two other dentists performing some of the dental activity included in that particular contract. This dentist would answer Question 7 as shown below. Please note, if the dentist switched business arrangements within the year, they would answer in the same way.

The dentist works for their own limited company or limited liability partnership. In EITHER case, the company/partnership has an associate arrangement with a practice owner and performs dentistry on their behalf (the dentist also has an arrangement with the HSCB to provide general dental services). This dentist would answer Question 6 as below: