Are more people getting NHS dental care in North Yorkshire?
According to the latest NHS dental statistics for England, dental teams delivered 37.6 million courses of treatment in 2025/26, an increase of 6.2% on the previous year.
A course of treatment is the care someone needs to address a dental problem. It can involve more than one appointment.
But more treatment doesn't necessarily mean more people are getting the care they need.
Across England, around two in five adults (40%) had seen an NHS dentist in the previous two years, well below the 50% recorded before the COVID-19 pandemic.
In North Yorkshire, 39.3% of adults had received NHS dental care in the two years to June 2026, down from 40.3% a year earlier. Before the pandemic, the figure was 50.7%.
The picture is more encouraging for children. Some 64% had seen an NHS dentist in the previous 12 months, up from 62.9% and above the England figure of 59.4%.
So who is benefiting from the extra treatment, and who is still missing out?
We look at the latest national analysis from Healthwatch England, alongside what people in North Yorkshire have told us about finding an NHS dentist, the cost of treatment and the impact of going without care.
How are people without a dentist missing out?
Improving access to urgent NHS dental care was a Government commitment in 2024.
Extra payments were introduced to encourage dental practices to provide more urgent appointments. Nationally, urgent courses of treatment increased by 8.4% last year, according to Healthwatch England's analysis.
However, research from the Office for National Statistics suggests that getting urgent care depends heavily on whether someone already has an NHS dentist.
Among people who needed urgent treatment:
- 87% of those already using an NHS dentist got an appointment.
- Just 16% of those without an NHS dentist got an appointment.
- Almost half (47%) of those without a dentist did not try to make an urgent appointment, despite needing care.
Research highlighted by Healthwatch England, using the GP Patient Survey, found a similar pattern. Some 87% of people seeking an NHS appointment at a practice they had previously visited were successful, compared with 38% of people trying to get an appointment as a new patient.
Unlike GP practices, NHS dentists aren't restricted to treating people who live in a particular area. You can contact any dental practice offering NHS appointments, although this doesn't mean they'll have space to take on new patients.
However, there is no permanent NHS dental registration system equivalent to the one used by GP practices. People can be left contacting individual dentists, sometimes without a waiting list or clear route into routine care.
Difficulty finding an NHS dentist remains a recurring concern in the experiences people share with Healthwatch North Yorkshire.
People have described long waits, practices no longer providing NHS treatment, the cost of going private and the effect of living with untreated dental problems.
For some, finding an NHS dentist has meant contacting practices across North Yorkshire without success.
One person told us:
"I moved to Catterick Garrison – and it’s a five-year wait to see an NHS dentist."
Others have found themselves paying privately after years of receiving NHS care. Someone who had used NHS dentistry for more than 40 years told us they had been unable to find another NHS dentist and had eventually moved to private care. Despite having ongoing gum problems, they said it had taken two years to find a private dental place.
The consequences can go well beyond the inconvenience of finding an appointment.
A woman from Scarborough described experiencing repeated infections, prolonged pain and difficulties obtaining a referral for hospital treatment. She eventually travelled 300 miles back to her childhood dentist, who arranged a referral to Scarborough Hospital.
"I then fought for another five years contacting dentists across North Yorkshire to be seen as an NHS patient just to complete a new referral."
We've also heard from people living with ongoing dental pain who have been unable to find NHS care, including those concerned about the effect of previous treatment on their teeth and jaw.
For some, the situation has become desperate. One person told us:
"I have pulled out four of my own teeth, and number five is getting to the stage it’s going to come out. I don’t want to leave the house."
Cost is another significant concern. People have told us about paying monthly private dental memberships, facing additional charges for treatment and struggling to afford care.
One person described having to use a credit card to pay an NHS dental bill of more than £300. Others have told us that private treatment simply isn't affordable, leaving them uncertain about where to turn.
Some people have also praised the care they receive from NHS dentists, while raising concerns about the difficulty of getting appointments and the cost of treatment.
Living in a rural area, having mobility difficulties or needing specialist treatment can create additional barriers.
Someone from Harrogate described relying on friends or carers to reach their NHS dentist in Knaresborough:
"Carers or friends take me to my dental appointments due to high taxi cost. It costs £30 return each time."
We've also heard about the difficulties people with disabilities and additional needs can face getting appropriate dental treatment, including travelling to hospitals further away and waiting for specialist appointments.
These experiences show that access is about more than whether an NHS dental appointment exists. It is also about whether people can find care, afford treatment, travel to appointments and get help before problems become more serious.
While individual experiences cannot tell us how widespread these difficulties are, the concerns people continue to share reflect many of the barriers highlighted by Healthwatch North Yorkshire previously.
Is access to NHS dentistry improving in North Yorkshire?
The latest NHS Business Services Authority dental statistics show that the proportion of adults receiving NHS dental care in North Yorkshire has fallen, despite a small improvement nationally.
In the two years to June 2026, 39.3% of adults in North Yorkshire received NHS dental care, compared with 40.3% a year earlier. Across England, the figure increased from 38.9% to 39.6% over the same period.
The longer-term picture is also concerning. Before the pandemic, in June 2019, 50.7% of adults in North Yorkshire had received NHS dental care in the previous two years, compared with 48.6% nationally.
By June 2026, the proportion in North Yorkshire had fallen by 11.4 percentage points, while the national figure had fallen by nine percentage points.
These figures measure the proportion of people who received NHS dental care, rather than how many tried unsuccessfully to get an appointment. They do not include private treatment.
Explore changes across England
Access to NHS dentistry varies across the country.
Healthwatch England has produced an interactive map showing how adult NHS dental access changed between 2024/25 and 2025/26.
You can search for North Yorkshire or another area to see whether the proportion of adults receiving NHS dental care has increased, decreased or remained broadly unchanged.
Healthwatch England's research also found that confidence in accessing timely NHS dental care improved in towns and cities between 2023 and 2025, but showed no improvement in rural areas.
Is more care reaching deprived communities?
There are encouraging signs that NHS dental activity is increasing fastest in England's most deprived communities.
However, the type of treatment people receive matters.
According to Healthwatch England's analysis of NHS dental activity, since 2019:
- Urgent courses of treatment increased by 23.6% in the 10% most deprived areas of England, compared with a fall of 1.2% in the least deprived.
- Non-urgent treatment increased by just 0.4% in the most deprived areas and fell by 6.7% in the least deprived.
- In 2025/26, urgent treatment accounted for 14.2% of all treatment in the most deprived communities, compared with 8.1% in the least deprived.
This suggests that people in poorer communities may be more likely to receive care when a dental problem becomes urgent, rather than getting routine treatment that could help prevent problems developing.
Healthwatch England's research also found a financial divide. Only 25% of people struggling financially felt confident they could access timely dental care, compared with 43% of people who said they were living comfortably.
The national figures do not tell us whether the increase in urgent care reflects greater dental need, difficulties accessing routine treatment or a combination of both.
What they do show is that delivering more urgent treatment does not necessarily mean people have fair access to ongoing dental care.
Is children's access improving?
The clearest evidence of improvement is in children's NHS dentistry.
According to the 2025/26 NHS dental statistics, around 7.17 million children saw an NHS dentist in England, equivalent to approximately 60% of children.
This is up from 57% the previous year, with around 270,000 more children receiving care.
Courses of treatment for children also increased by 7%, reaching approximately 13 million.
What about children in North Yorkshire?
The latest figures are more encouraging for children locally.
In the 12 months to June 2026, 64% of children living in North Yorkshire received NHS dental care, compared with 62.9% a year earlier.
This is also above the England figure of 59.4%.
However, children's access in North Yorkshire remains slightly below the 65.3% recorded before the pandemic.
The adult figures cover the previous two years, while the children's figures cover the previous 12 months.
These figures show progress, but also underline the importance of ensuring children can access regular dental care, helping to prevent tooth decay and identify problems early.
What needs to change?
The latest figures show some progress, particularly for children and in the amount of treatment delivered in deprived communities.
However, NHS dentistry is still falling short of the Government's ambitions, and substantial changes are needed to ensure everyone can access care.
Healthwatch England has identified three priorities for improvement.
1. Make it easier to find routine and urgent NHS dental appointments
People should not have to spend hours contacting individual practices to find treatment.
Healthwatch England recommends that NHS 111 call handlers have access to up-to-date, centralised information about available urgent NHS dental appointments. This would help people get the care they need through a single call.
The NHS organisations responsible for planning and funding local dental services should also do more to promote the urgent dental care services they have arranged.
Dental computer systems should be improved so that appointment availability can be shared across practices in real time, providing more reliable information than the current NHS Find a Dentist service.
2. Encourage more dentists to work in areas with poor access
Some areas with the greatest difficulties accessing NHS dentistry have seen the smallest increases in dentists carrying out NHS work.
Healthwatch England is calling on the Government to ensure its forthcoming NHS workforce plan sets out how it will recruit and retain enough dentists to provide sustainable NHS services.
This should include reviewing the effectiveness of the £20,000 'golden hello' payment, introduced in 2024 to encourage dentists to work in areas where people struggle to access NHS dental care.
The Government should also confirm whether newly qualified dentists will be required to work in the NHS for a period after qualifying.
3. Fundamentally reform NHS dentistry
Healthwatch is calling on the Department of Health and Social Care to fundamentally reform the NHS dental contract, which sets out how NHS dental services are provided and how dentists are paid.
It recommends that reform should:
- Be informed by a full public consultation that is open about the challenges facing NHS dentistry, the options for reform and the difficult choices involved.
- Give people the right to register with a local NHS dentist, as they can with a GP, so they can access ongoing preventative check-ups, treatment and urgent care when needed. Healthwatch England's previous research found public support for a registration system.
- Change the way dentists are paid so that they are rewarded for improving people's oral health (outcomes), as well as the amount of treatment they provide (activity).
These are Healthwatch England's recommendations, informed by its national research and people's experiences.
They also reflect many of the issues people have raised with Healthwatch North Yorkshire over several years.
Share your experience with us
Have you struggled to find an NHS dentist in North Yorkshire? Perhaps you've had to travel further for treatment, faced unexpected costs or had a positive experience of getting the care you needed.
We want to hear about it.
Your experiences help us understand what is working, where people are facing difficulties and what needs to improve.
