New £5.8m hub aims to tackle 'dental desert'

The centre in Barking aims to provide NHS dental care to more than 5,000 patients a year

A new £5.8m "cutting-edge" dental centre and training hub is to be built in east London.

The centre in Barking aims to provide NHS dental care to more than 5,000 patients annually, as well as train 130 new dental students each year.

The new hub, which is due to open in September 2026, is being funded by Barking and Dagenham Council and Queen Mary University of London, with the two organisations working together to deliver the project.

Professor Sir Mark Caulfield, vice principal of health at Queen Mary's, said the facility represented a "once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform oral health and wider wellbeing for the residents of Barking and Dagenham".

Council leader Dominic Twomey said attracting dentists to the area had always been difficult and said the area was "under-dentisted".

The Labour councillor said the new centre would "unlock good quality dental care for thousands of our residents that otherwise wouldn't have access to it".

"It will help the rest of east London and probably the rest of the country because when the dental students qualify they will be working across the country for years to come - to try and address these dental deserts," he added.

Currently 3,500 NHS dentist positions in the UK are vacant and one in eight UK dentists are within five years of retirement

NHS figures for the Barking area show 65% of three to five year olds and almost 80% of 18 to 34 year olds currently have no access to NHS dental services, and two in five children have tooth decay.

Doctors say there is "significant evidence" to show links between oral health and general health – particularly around obesity, smoking, cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

Farida Fortune, who is a professor of medicine in relation to oral health at Queen Mary's, said: "If you don't have oral health, you don't have general health."

The professor said by getting dentists out into the local community from the centre "you're able to educate around not only the mouth, but general health".

'Removing barriers'

The centre will be built within two floors of Maritime House in Barking town centre, and is mainly funded through the council's Strategic Community Infrastructure Levy funding programme.

Undergraduate and postgraduate students from Queen Mary University who will be based there will deliver care through a community-based outreach model.

The centre will also create about 44 local jobs, including security, cleaning, and dental nursing, those behind the project said.

Professor Caulfield said: "By bringing world-class dental education directly into the community, we are removing long-standing barriers to access and ensuring that those who need care the most can receive it free of charge, close to home."