Improving the preventive pathways for vulnerable families from two paediatric patient groups by enhancing Childsmile provision to tackle inequality

Start Date: Negotiable
Stipend: None

There is no clear pathway in Scotland for the delivery of prevention to child patients being treated within the Cleft Lip and Palate Service, or for those who undergo dental general anaesthetic (DGA) for extraction of decayed teeth. DGA is the most common reason for admission to hospital for children in the UK, and incurs huge costs for the NHS. Both paediatric patient groups are more likely to come from disadvantaged backgrounds, and therefore already experience a greater burden of disease than their peers, and would clearly benefit from an intervention to improve prevention.

Childsmile (www.child-smile.org) , the national oral health improvement programme in Scotland aims to tackle inequalities through tailored support delivered to vulnerable families in the home, by a Dental Health Support Worker.

This PhD project aims to assess the feasibility of conducting a Randomized Controlled Trial to test the effectiveness of an enhanced Childsmile intervention in these two high risk patient groups.

The successful candidate will use the Childsmile model to develop an evidence based, tailored, early-years intervention to families within these vulnerable groups to engage them in prevention (diet, tooth brushing), and facilitate and sustain links with health services and wider community initiatives and support groups. It is anticipated that this will reduce the burden of an unnecessary and largely preventable disease on the NHS and patients that falls disproportionately on the most vulnerable in society, and with the Childsmile infrastructure in place in each health board, could be efficiently scaled up and rolled out across the country into the future.

The successful applicant will join a vibrant and motivated research team within the department of Community Oral Health, Glasgow Dental School (http://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/dental/research/communityoralhealth/) and will collaborate with surgeons, speech and language therapists, audiologists and psychologists involved in the multidisciplinary care of these patients.

In addition, this PhD will provide high-quality training to the student in subject-specific topics (public health, NHS service development, community health promotion work) and transferrable research skills (qualitative and quantitative skills-design/ collection/ analysis/ interpretation of data, communication skills, research governance, good research practice including data management and integrity, systematic reviews) which will enhance their personal and professional development.