Letter

Just filling you in

Dear healthmatters—An important change has happened in dentistry of which readers may not be aware. Since the start of 1996, 30,000 dentists in the UK can use the title ‘Dr’. For the last 150 years we have used the title ‘Mr’ because we linked with the Guild of Barber Surgeons. ‘Dr’ was taken over by physicians although it is really for graduates with a PhD. Medical doctors took their ‘Dr’ title as they began to change from being herbalists. The change to ‘Dr’ for dentists, which is not compulsory, has been announced by the General Dental Council, and results from EC ‘levelling up’ of professional titles.

The title ‘Dr’ presents some difficulties. The first and most important is that we do not get much medical training-so you should not ask for authoritative advice on piles, dandruff, or meningitis from your newly found ‘dentist Dr’. It is very important that we are described as what we are, and not as what we are not.

Another difficulty may be that this ‘added status’ could stimulate further the privatisation of general practice dentistry. Most, but not all, surgeries have moved to become as private as they are able. Dentists have run a 10 year campaign to get this change, and would not have pushed so hard had there not been some profitable end in sight.