Mobile dental clinics would help alleviate school backlogs

A LOCAL TD is proposing the establishment of a mobile dental clinic in each province for a faster delivery of dental appointments for school students.

Fianna Fáil’s Roscommon-Galway Deputy Martin Daly has called for the clinics to be established amid ongoing concerns about the severe backlog in school dental appointments and persistent staffing shortages within the public dental service.

Nearly 360,000 children have missed out on appointments as part of the school dental programme in the last five years.

Deputy Daly believes that the mobile dental clinics can help address the backlogs and one should be established in each province.

These clinics would provide routine examinations, preventative care and oral health education, while referring children who require more complex treatment to fixed dental facilities.

“The school dental programme is falling behind. We need practical solutions that can help us catch up and ensure children are not missing out on routine dental care,” said Deputy Daly.

He highlighted that other European countries are already demonstrating that mobile clinics can help deliver care directly to children and improve access, particularly where services are under pressure.

International research suggests the cost of a fully equipped mobile dental clinic could be in the region of €500,000.

Deputy Daly is seeking a detailed costing from the Parliamentary Budget Office to establish what a model like this could cost in an Irish context.

“This proposal is about ensuring that every child has access to basic dental care, regardless of where they live or whether the local public dental service has vacancies that cannot be filled,” he explained.