Dental public health: a trainee perspective from England

Dental public health (DPH) specialty trainees are dentally qualified and focus on improving oral health at a population level in addition to individual patients. DPH trainees enter training with a broad range of dental career experiences. To attain specialist registration, DPH trainees undertake a 3–4-year programme which develops both technical and strategic leadership skills. DPH training includes activities such as advocating for oral health within the general health context, developing and applying evidence-based guidelines to support health improvement initiatives and addressing oral health inequalities amongst vulnerable and disadvantaged groups. Experiential learning is a key component of DPH training, delivered through projects and placements across a range of health and social care organisations. This trainee-authored paper provides an overview of the possible motivation for entering DPH specialty training, examples of the training experiences involved and consideration of how the wider dental workforce benefit from engaging with DPH teams.