Dental care crisis near

Too few dentists are willing to be on call over weekends.

Long-standing Rotorua dentist Stewart Edward believes the after-hours roster for dental care in Rotorua will be scrapped soon as too few dentists are willing to be part of it.

Mr Edward, whose practice set up and maintained the roster, said finding enough dentists to cover the weekends was an ongoing problem and he believed the system was now an unrealistic one to maintain.

The lack of after-hours dental care has raised its head again after a Rotorua resident discovered there were no duty dentists on call some weekends.

Mr Edward said while some weekends were still covered he didn't expect that to continue for much longer.

" It's just about getting to the stage where it is about to fall apart completely."

He said some dentists would make themselves available to provide after-hours care to existing patients which made a good relationship with your dentist even more important.

Mr Edward said Rotorua people would also have to be prepared to travel out of town for out of hours care at times.

He raised concerns around the lack of after hours care with the Lakes District Health Board chief executive several months ago.

The Board has previously said people needing dental care outside of normal hours were being "medically managed" at hospital emergency departments because of a shortage of dentists available for after-hours care.