Improving Oral Health and Access to Dental Care
National Health and Hospitals Reform Commission Fact Sheet
Universal access to dental careExpanding our dental workforce
Promoting oral health
What do you think?
More information
A lack of universal access to high quality dental health services has a significant impact on the health outcomes of Australians.
Universal access to dental care
All Australians should have universal access to preventative and restorative dental care and dentures, regardless of their ability to pay. This should occur through a new ‘Denticare Australia’ scheme. This new scheme would provide preventative, diagnostic and restorative services, including extractions and dentures. This could be funded by an estimated increase in the Medicare Levy of 0.75 per cent in addition to existing funding by governments.Australians would get the choice of either a dental health plan from an insurer or rely on expanded public dental services funded by ‘Denticare Australia’.
There should also be a nation-wide expansion of pre-school and school dental programs.
Expanding our dental workforce
Australia’s dental workforce should be built up through a one-year internship scheme prior to full registration. This would bring dental practitioners in line with other medical practitioners.Promoting oral health
More funding should be provided to promote improved oral health, with interventions to be decided on relative cost-effectiveness assessment.What do you think?
The Government is undertaking a series of face-to-face consultations and is using this website to seek the views of Australians on these and other options.What do you think? Tell us at a consultation visit or complete the Tell us what you think form to provide your views.
These views will be compiled and reported to Government prior to deciding what health reform should be undertaken.
Individual responses will not be posted to the views provided on this site.
