The silver tsunami

The silver tsunami. It’s a great catch phrase and easy to throw around.

Like any tsunami, its not going to be pretty when it hits. Focus on the word tsunami rather than silver.

The amazing Dr Mark Wotherspoon operates his mobile dentistry service from our practice.

Mark is passionate about the provision of dental care to the frail and aged. Not the sexy part of dentistry. He recently presented at the FDI conference in Sydney. Hopefully you took the time to attend his lectures.

Mark’s onto something and if good ideas, passion, oral health activism and speaking up for those in need of care counts, then he’s right up there with the most successful dentists people in the country. It’s a massive problem that faces the profession and the community, and the problem is only getting bigger. Mark’s doing more than his share.

And yet…

It should be a massive market that every dental practice is trying to serve.

And yet…

Mark sometimes refers patients into the practice when they have sufficient capacity to attend in person and I must admit these can be the most challenging of cases. Lovely people but the dentistry is always a challenge.

Mostly because it takes an instant paradigm shift in the way that the patient and their family members/carers are treated.

And how everyone’s expectations of what is the most appropriate care are managed.

This article was recently published. It should be a ‘must read’, as it reflects the challenges and attitudes of the profession.

Here are the main themes, incase you don’t read the article

Reading this article makes me feel uneasy.

About what is not happening now and what the future holds for this part of dentistry.

For this being true of our practice…

“The pressures of a productivity-based healthcare system were seen as a barrier: ‘everybody, regardless of whether it's community or private, a lot of our KPIs are productivity-based and trying to provide domiciliary care is going to be low productivity’” Nilsson et al

There’s all sorts of arguments for utilising the skill set of OHTs to provide this care. The temptation is for the profession to abdicate responsibility to this group of professionals and provide inadequate support in what is anchallenging field. It needs to be true partnerships between all parties involved; dentists, OHTs, the patient, their family, and the care provider. The OHTs also need appropriate training and mentoring.

The danger of any future government money becoming available in a ‘scheme’, is the abuse of the scheme such as happened with the now abandoned CDDS.

There’s no easy answer.

Maybe the first step is as Dr Mark recommends; start with a “You’re in your seventies” assessment, where you reassess your patient, have a conversation about what the future might hold and begin to prepare them and their mouth for their eighties and nineties. That conversation needs to be delicate (as no one likes thinking about frail old age) but clear.

Dr Mark is the founder of Dr Mark’s Hygenie, a denture cleaning device, click the image to check it out

Have a great week and share with a dental friend as Dr Mark needs more oral health acitivists!

Rosie