Dentists in Manchester

posted: 01/06/2010

NHS Manchester is making efforts to improve dental health and access to NHS dental care. Four new practices have opened in the last 18 months and 3 more will open by September.
 

Dental health is important for people living with HIV.

Urgent?
There are 32 appointments reserved across the city for people needing urgent dental care.
 

Call the Manchester Dental Helpline on 0161 230 6011
 

The Helpline will arrange emergency appointments, usually on the same day and close to home, and also signpost people to dentists with space for new patients and advise about dental services.
 

HIV and dental care

Regular visits to the dentist are important for people with HIV. Not only will this help general dental health, but it also allows dentists to check for gum and mouth disorders, such as oral thrush and badly bleeding gums, which are more common among people living with HIV.
George House Trust and the HIV clinic can help you find an NHS dentist, or a dentist that is particularly skilled or interested in treating people with HIV. Not all dentists offer NHS care.
 

Tell or not?
It’s a good idea to let dentists know of significant medical conditions like HIV, or if are taking any medication. This will help them ensure that you receive the most appropriate treatment. It is unprofessional, and also illegal for dentists to discriminate against you because of HIV, race, or sexuality or other reasons under equality laws.
 

Dentists have been told by the General Dental Council that they cannot refuse to treat somebody just because they are HIV-positive. And universal hygiene precautions are enough to prevent the transmission of HIV during dental treatment.
 

Namlife on dental care

HIV+ Working Surgeon

posted: 14/01/2009

An HIV-positive surgeon in Israel is being allowed to continue working. He or she is taking HIV treatment and has an undetectable viral load. The Israelis have effectively issued a statement, rather like the Swiss statement we have been reporting on over the last year. Both statements are about how effective HIV treatment can reduce infectivity to close to zero.

simple precautions are enough

The Israeli Ministry of Health has decided that the surgeon with HIV who is receiving antiretroviral treatment may return to carrying out invasive surgical procedures, providing that he or she maintains an undetectable viral load, follows infection control procedures and uses two layers of surgical gloves when operating. 
 

Time for UK HIV+ healthcare workers ban to be reviewed

Healthcare workers with HIV are routinely banned from surgical procedures of any kind, even very minor ones such as stitching wounds. This affects some doctors, midwives, some nurses, dentists, and some ambulance staff, among others. 
 

The Israeli decision is increasing the pressure on bodies regulating UK and other countries' healthcare employment to review their guidance on healthcare workers with HIV engaging in exposure-prone, invasive procedures.

In the United Kingdom, for example, the General Medical Council and the General Dental Council require that HIV-positive healthcare workers desist from carrying out exposure-prone procedures – anything that involves cutting, suturing, use of needles or delivery of babies using forceps or suction, and almost all dental work, – and all healthcare workers recruited to the National Health Service who will be carrying out these types of procedures are tested for HIV. Many healthcare workers have been forced to retire or change careers as a result of the guidance, including several in the NorthWest of England.
 

The Israeli statement is the first official acknowledgement that HIV treatment reduces the risk of bloodborne HIV transmission to such low levels that a doctor, dentist, nurse or midwife can continue working.
It could help reduce stigma for people with HIV, as long as media storms about fears of HIV transmission from healthcare workers can be avoided.
 

NAM's HIV Treatment Update in August/September took a detailed look at whether healthcare workers should be allowed to carry out surgical procedures.
 

HIV is present in potentially infectious quantities in blood, semen, vaginal fluids and breastmilk and, as a result, HIV can be passed on through injecting drug use, unprotected sex, and from a mother to her baby.
 

It’s not inevitable that a person exposed to HIV will become infected with the virus. One of the factors that affects this risk is the viral load of the person with HIV. HIV treatment lowers viral load both in blood and genital fluids.
There’s recently been a lot of debate about the infectiousness of people taking HIV treatment who have an undetectable viral load.
 

Swiss doctors kick-started the debate about a year ago. In a statement, they said that a person taking HIV treatment, who’d had an undetectable viral load for at least six months, who took all their medication and who didn’t have a sexually transmitted infection, was not infectious to their heterosexual partners.
 

The current consensus seems to be that HIV treatment, and all the Swiss conditions, reduces the risk of sexual transmission, but that a small risk may still be present.
 

Full report in the USA's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report
Some further details are in the aidsmap report
Source
 

Manchester, HIV and Dentists Survey

posted: 12/11/2008

NHS Manchester is aware that people living with HIV have different experiences of accessing and being treated by NHS dentists in Manchester. They want everyone in Manchester to be treated fairly and equally and so they are working with George House Trust and other voluntary sector organisations to collect from people living with HIV their experiences of using NHS dental services.

All information given will be treated confidentially and will be used anonymously to make recommendations to the NHS commissioners (who arrange and pay for the NHS dental service) and to the dentists (who provide the treatment).

The survey uses a secure and confidential survey system. If you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact Engagement Manager, Val Bayliss-Brideaux on 0161 217 4311.

Go to the survey

You can also write to FREEPOST RRSS-EKKJ-RRKY, Baguley Clinic, M23 1NA

 

Remember, if you are having difficulty finding a NHS dentist or have a question about local health services, you can contact the Patient Advice and Liaison Service on 0161 219 9451 or you can email them. This is a free and confidential information and advice service for NHS Manchester. PALS is open Monday to Friday from 9.00am - 5.00pm and if the line is busy, please leave a message on the 24-hour confidential answer-phone and you will be called back.

Dental Problems Update

posted: 07/10/2008

Feedback from the dental consultation event held at George House Trust on 1 October 2008.

As many of you will be aware there have been a lot of complaints about how people living with HIV are treated by dentists.

We recently hosted a consultation event for people living with HIV to find out more about people's experience of dentists.

Some good news came out of the event as a number of people contacted George House Trust and said that they had disclosed their HIV status to their dentist and were very happy with the treatment that they had received.  Other people had examples of good practice such as surgeries making it easier for people to disclose.

21 people came along to the dentistry meeting with a good mix of people using all the different George House Trust services.

half the attenders have no dentist

Of the people attending half did not have a dentist. Mostly this was because people had tried unsuccessfully to find a dentist. There was also confusion over charging and private dentistry so some people were worried about being unable to afford treatment.

Different treatment

There were cases of different treatment of people living with HIV. Often people living with HIV seem to be asked to have double appointments for routine work, be asked to come in at the end of the day or be taken off a list for being a few minutes late. Some people were concerned that they had been over charged and that their dentist appeared to be working on piece work and not giving a good service.

We were pleased to have representatives of the PCT at the meeting, Val Bayliss Brideaux from the Engagement Team and Mark Carroll from the Patient and Liaison service (PALS).

What will happen next

• We will continue to speak to the PCTs across the region raising the issues any concerns regarding people with HIV accessing dentists
• PALs tell us that there is capacity among NHS dentists so we will continue to support people accessing dentists
• We will feed in specific complaints about treatment. We will do this in consultation with the person making the complaint to make sure they are happy with the way a complaint is taken forward
• We need your help! Please continue to give us feedback (good and bad) about dentists as we want to publicise the good practice as well as highlight the bad.

Please email any examples of good or bad practice to Lynda Shentall Director of Services

Thanks to those who came for the event, thanks to the PCT for helping with the costs on the day.