Pain of marathon queues adds to dental-service woes

Dental patients queued for up to seven hours for government dental services, while the overall annual quota since the pandemic has been slashed in half despite huge demand, according to the Audit Commission.

In its report yesterday, the commission outlined the Department of Health's provision of emergency dental services, which are carried out during general public sessions at 11 government clinics.

However, the quota for government dental services has been halved from its original 40,322 in 2018-19 to 20,337 in 2022-23, while the quota allocation rate has increased from 92.3 to 99.2 percent.

The health department explained that the reduction since January 2020 was due to the pandemic and a manpower shortage.

"The commission believes the Department of Health needs to take measures to enhance the provision of emergency dental services. It would be ideal to increase service volume to at least 40,000 a year, which is prepandemic level, through government clinics or a new service model," the commission said.

The watchdog said health authorities need to improve quota distribution arrangements. Quotas are currently distributed on a first-come, first-served basis and registration begins at midnight.

"The commission visited clinics in December 2023 and February 2024 and noted that in four there were a few people queuing at about 5pm for the next day's quota - a wait of at least seven hours," the watchdog said.

"In three clinics, the number of people queuing at 10pm accounted for 36 percent to 57 percent of quotas, indicating that quite a number of people queued a few hours early in order to secure a spot for preliminary registration."

The commission urged health authorities to review quota distribution arrangements to facilitate people who need to secure a spot for dental services.

In a related development, dental graduates may have to take mandatory internships at public hospitals next year, the Health Bureau said.

As the Legislative Council reviews a bill on dentist registration, Undersecretary for Health Libby Lee Ha-yun has told lawmakers that the arrangement aims to improve professionalism by giving graduates the opportunity to gain experience.

The Dental Council of Hong Kong and the University of Hong Kong's faculty of dentistry both support the arrangement and are collaborating with the Department of Health to hash out details.

But medical and health services sector lawmaker David Lam Tzit-yuen said most dental schools around the world do not have internship arrangements. He called for a public hearing to allow HKU dental students to directly express their opinions to lawmakers.

Another lawmaker, Connie Lam So-wai, said the sudden implementation of the new arrangement may disrupt the current curriculum for dental students. Hong Kong is facing a serious shortage of dentists, which cannot be eased until 2040. The government hopes to introduce nonlocally trained dentists to ease the shortage by amending the law.

The shortage in the public sector is even more acute as about three-quarters of local dentists are in private practices, Lee said, adding that the vacancy rate in the Department of Health has reached 27 percent.

wallis.wang@singtaonewscorp.com