Dental Officer

Job overview

Are you a compassionate and motivated dentist looking for a rewarding career where you can make a real difference? Join Oxfordshire Community Dental Service in Banbury as a Dental Officer and help deliver outstanding care to patients with additional needs across the county. This is a full-time role however a minimum of 22.5 hours per week (3 days) can be considered.

In this varied and fulfilling role, you'll provide comprehensive routine and urgent dental care for adult special care and paediatric patients in a wide range of settings, including community dental clinics, hospitals, residential care homes, mental health units, homeless services and patients' own homes. You'll deliver treatment using a range of techniques, including local anaesthetic, sedation and general anaesthetic, ensuring high-quality, patient-centred care tailored to individual needs.

Working as part of a supportive multidisciplinary team, you'll contribute to clinical governance, quality improvement, health promotion and service development, while benefiting from ongoing training and opportunities to develop your clinical expertise.

We're looking for an enthusiastic team player with excellent communication skills, a commitment to high standards of care and a passion for improving oral health outcomes for some of our most vulnerable communities. If you're ready to build a fulfilling career in community dentistry, we'd love to hear from you.

Main duties of the job

• Provide high quality treatment planning, preventive and urgent/routine NHS dental care treatment services for adult special care and paediatric patients.
• Manage the day to day activities of the dental surgery in conjunction with the other members of the team
• Supervise and delegate appropriate tasks to the Dental Care Professionals in accordance with current General Dental Council regulations where applicable.
• Ensure records are completed accurately and contemporaneously and provide statistical and other information to the Business Services Authority and Trust directors and commissioners as required.
• Liaise with colleagues in hospitals, primary care and local authorities to ensure and improve the quality of patient care.
• Undertake necessary training and development to comply with national, professional and Trust requirements and participate in regular appraisal with the Line Manager.
• Take part in all aspects of clinical governance including GDC lifelong learning, clinical audit, peer review, quality improvement and clinical supervision.
• To take part in epidemiological surveys/screening/health promotion activities as required.
• To work flexibly in locations as required by the service, including primary and secondary care locations, nursing/residential homes etc.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

Dental services in Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust are provided by the Oxfordshire Community Dental Service (OCDS). This service provides National Health Service (NHS) dentistry to a wide range of patients including both adults and children requiring either special care dentistry, or specialist care. In addition to this core role the service also provides emergency care for patients requiring urgent dental treatment who do not currently have a dentist of their own.

The service provides care for patients from ten dental clinics across Oxfordshire located at Abingdon, Banbury, Bicester, Didcot, East Oxford, Luther Street, Kidlington, Wantage and Witney.

Several of the clinics are equipped to provide dental treatment with inhalation and/or intravenous sedation and the service also provides dental treatment under general anaesthesia for children and adult special care patients at the John Radcliffe and Horton Hospitals.

For patients who are unable to access the clinics easily there is a countywide domiciliary (home visit) service available by referral. All the clinics have wheelchair access and facilities for patients with disabilities and there is a hoist available at East Oxford Dental Clinic and Murray House for patients who have difficulty transferring into the dental chair.

This role will be based in across Oxfordshire and the successful candidate will be expected to have;

• excellent clinical skills
• strong communication and inter-personal skills
• the ability to coordinate and carry out tasks
• comprehensive IT skills (experience using Microsoft Publisher, PowerPoint, Excel, Outlook and Word).

Applicant requirements

You must have appropriate UK professional registration.

This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.