Dental regulation at work: Protecting the public in 2017/18

14 Feb 2019

A profession-specific annual report summary that looks into the work of the Dental Board of Australia over the year to 30 June 2018 has now been published.

The report draws on data from the 2017/18 annual report by AHPRA and the National Boards. This information provides a snapshot of the profession as at 30 June 2018, and includes the number of applications for registration, outcomes of practitioner audits and segmentation of the registrant base by gender, age, registration type and principal place of practice.

Notifications information includes the number of complaints or concerns received, matters opened and closed during the year, types of complaint, monitoring and compliance and matters involving immediate action.

Insights into the profession include:

• 23,093 dental practitioners were registered in 2017/18.
• 1,660 new applications for registration were received.
• Dental practitioners make up 3.3% of all registered health practitioners in Australia.
• The number of dental practitioners increased by 3.2% from 2016/17.
• 51.2% dental practitioners are women; 48.8% are men.
• New South Wales (NSW) was the principal place of practice for most dental practitioners (6,981).
• Northern Territory (NT) was home to the smallest number (168).
• The age bracket with the largest number of dental practitioners was 30–34 (3,598).
• 556 dental practitioners were under 25 years of age.
• 67 were aged 80 or over.
• 539 notifications (complaints or concerns) were lodged with AHPRA about dental practitioners.
• AHPRA closed 554 notifications about dental practitioners in 2017/18. This represented 7.8% of all matters closed across the 15 professions in the National Scheme.
• 123 cases were being monitored by AHPRA at 30 June 2018 for compliance with conditions placed on dental practitioners’ registration.
• Immediate action was considered by the Board 17 times and taken 10 times in 2017/18.
• 55 complaints were made about possible statutory offences by dental practitioners during the year. The majority of new matters related to title and practice protection.

To download this report, or to view the main 2017/18 annual report and summary reports by state or territory, visit the AHPRA website.

In January and February 2019, AHPRA and the National Boards are publishing summaries that break down 2017/18 data for 13 other boards in the National Scheme.

For more information

• Visit the AHPRA website
• Lodge an online enquiry form
• For registration enquiries: 1300 419 495 (within Australia) +61 3 9275 9009 (overseas callers)
• For media enquiries: (03) 8708 9200