Putting the power in your punch

With so much going on behind the scenes in our industry, it’s good to know that the DHAA advocacy team are in your corner

By Bill Suen, DHAA CEO

Thanks to the persistence and dedication of DHAA members advocating for our profession over the years. We have achieved a significant milestone in acquiring access to Medicare provider numbers in July 2022. There are many other advocacy areas that the profession requires, and the DHAA has been working constantly to raise awareness and knocking on doors to have these matters heard.

Increase funding for oral health

The DHAA is an active member of the National Oral Health Alliance and the Victorian Oral Health Alliance. In addition, our state committees are proactively involved in local advisory committees and working groups in WA, SA, Qld and Vic to review various oral health plans and funding models. Through these activities, the DHAA supports the call for an increase in Commonwealth and State government funding for public dental services to address the service gaps and waiting times.

Aged care

The DHAA has taken the lead in setting our goals to have 50% of all residential aged care facilities in Australia receive regular onsite oral health service by 2026. To achieve this goal the we have been working on the following fronts:

1 Establishing an aged care chapter to provide support and resources to members to service the aged care sector.

2 Provide a flexible online aged care education program to provide oral health practitioners with the skills and knowledge to navigate the aged care system and meet the special needs of the older population.

3 Advocate the provision of onsite oral health service to residential aged care facilities and provide business-to-business marketing of this service to aged care providers.

4 Advocate for a senior dental benefits scheme.

With the gradual return to the endemic phase, the DHAA has commenced talks with a number of aged care providers, both government and private, to explore opportunities on behalf of our members to provide onsite oral health service to residents of various aged care facilities.

We have also made written submissions to advocate for more prescriptive accreditation standards on oral health for aged care facilities.

Paradigm shift to oral health promotion

The DHAA is constantly exploring opportunities to advocate for oral health promotion. This approach has been embedded in many of our submissions and activities. The DHAA 2023 Federal Budget presubmission, for example, calls for “A preventative, maintenance and minimal intervention approach to reduce the burden on the clinical paradigm that has shown to be ineffective within the current system”. Our recommendations include the provision of incentive payments to “entice and support oral health practitioners to establish their onsite oral health service to residential aged care facilities”, to «develop a multi-lingual website with oral health information and instruction”, and to “award a grant for oral health professionals to develop health promotion activities among CALD population groups”.

Provider number follow up

Ongoing work is being conducted to liaise with individual health funds to support the implementation of their systems to recognise the Medicare provider numbers for our profession. There are also issues that require clarification and negotiations with each fund such as specialist treatment plan claims.

The expert advisory group provides an avenue for stakeholders to review, discuss and recommend activities to foster the implementation and uptake of the provider numbers through the transition phase.

Dental Board and Dental Council

The DHAA is a member of the Dental Board of Australia Dental Stakeholder Liaison Group which meets regularly to discuss practice issues and consult on regulatory and policy reviews and changes. It has made written submissions on behalf of our profession and our members to both the Dental Board and Dental Council.

Regulatory work

Besides the Dental Board of Australia, there are many regulatory bodies responsible for practices that oral health practitioners are involved in. These include radiation, laser and drugs and poisons as well as therapeutic goods. Over the past year, the DHAA has had communications with various state and territory governments, the Commonwealth Department of Health and Aged Care, The Department of Veteran Affairs, the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) and the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Agency (ARPANSA) to advocate for our members’ treatment rights in OPGs, anaesthetics and other related matters.