Perhaps a better thing to say would be "Now it's like this"
Many dentists of a certain age seem to exist in some sort of hallucinogenic state where they think the world shouldn't change and it was always better the way it was.
A few examples of this are a follows:
In the 1980s (yes, that is 30 years ago now) the prior approval limit for NHS treatment on item of service used to be over £1000. In other words you could pretty much do almost any treatment course you wanted on a patient without having to ask for permission. Everybody in that situation who had an NHS practice did lots of bridges on anybody who had gaps and didn't have to ask permission.
Newly qualifying dentists in the 1990s would bemoan the fact the the prior approval limit would be dropped to 600 and in fact that's where it was when I was a VDP in 1997.
Dentists who had practiced in the 1980s would bemoan the fact that the contract changed in 1992 providing a large pay cut where many guys had to go private (incidentally, the guys that went private were the early adopters - they were the innovators and were the ones who went on to make private practice successful)
Fast forward to 2006 when the contract ultimately changed again and item of service was lost. All of us who then worked in item of service said "Oh item of service was much better. We can't make the contract work now. The UDA system is terrible"
Beware of looking back and thinking that life was always better than it is now. That is worshipping a false idol.
The way it is now is the way it is now. If you want it to be better in the future then be part of affecting change. If you don't want to affect the future then keep you mouth closed and do what you do at the moment.
It's still fantastic working in dentistry and it's still brilliant being a dentist. Yes the system is different to the way it was then but many things are different to the way they were then.
Blog Post Number: 902
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