Next steps

This exercise has provided many useful insights into dental professionals’ and stakeholder organisations’ views about a future CPD scheme. It has also provided information about the working of the current scheme, which we are taking on board and reflecting on. The next stage of this work is to evaluate the current CPD scheme, so that we can better understand which parts of the scheme works well and which do not. This will help us to assess the gap between the current scheme and the findings from this discussion.

This evaluation will also allow us to explore the impact of a significant reduction of in-person CPD activities and (any) growth of online and other distance learning activities in 2020-2021, something neither we nor our respondents could have foreseen at the time of the discussion document’s publication.

Following the evaluation, we will pull together the evidence gathered so far, reflect on responses received to this document, and develop our proposals for a future scheme, which we aim to test at workshops in late 2022 and consulted upon in early 2023.