Written question asked by Daniel Kawczynski (Conservative) on Monday, 6 February 2006, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Wednesday, 8 February 2006. It was answered by Baroness Winterton of Doncaster (Labour) on Thursday, 16 February 2006 on behalf of the Department of Health.

Dentistry

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Health how many NHS dentists there were in Shrewsbury and Atcham constituency in (a) 2004 and (b) 2005.

Answer

The table shows the number of national health service dentists in the Shrewsbury and Atcham constituency in 2004 and 2005:

General dental services (GDS) and personal dental services (PDS): number of dentists in Shrewsbury and Atcham parliamentary constituency as at 30 September each year
	Number
2004	71
2005	80
Notes: 1. Data includes all notifications of dentists joining or leaving the GDS or PDS, received by the Dental Practice Board, up to 19 October 2005. Figures for the numbers of dentists at specified dates may vary depending upon the notification period; for example, data with a later notification period will include more recent notifications of dentists joining or leaving the GDS or PDS. 2. Dentists include principals, assistants and trainees. Prison contracts have been excluded from the data. 3. The postcode of the dental practice was used to allocate dentists to specific geographic areas. Constituency areas have been defined using the Office for National Statistics all fields postcode directory. Source: Dental Practice Board

Secondary information