It "defies logic" that only Melbourne based dental schools get funding for a rural clinical placement program, La Trobe University says.
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The education provider wants a funding rethink for its Bendigo dentistry school and has told a federal inquiry that programs pushing only city-based students into rural clinical rotations are flawed.
It argues that students who study in regional areas are less likely to work in metropolitan areas upon graduation.
"Despite increasing demand from rural students, we are currently unable to increase our enrolments owing to constraints on pre-clinical simulation places and clinical placement supervision capacity in regional and rural locations," the university told the inquiry.
The university wants extra funding to bring it in line with competitors' dental schools.
It has highlighted educator shortages to keep rural placements going, increasing teaching costs and Victoria's lack of university-led dental clinics.
"This means that universities are not able to access funding through Dental Health Services Victoria to treat public patients," La Trobe told the inquiry.
'It's a bit worrying', dentistry student
The federal inquiry has been biting into Australia's dental system to try to find a "realistic and achievable" pathway towards universal oral and dental healthcare access.
It painted a bleak picture of dentist shortages in a recently published interim report.
"Australia's oral and dental health system is broken," the report said.
"Reforming the way in which oral and dental health services are funded and coordinated is a huge task, and one that governments across the political spectrum have been reluctant to take on."
Strains on the system were obvious to dentistry student Daniel Hughes when he went out on placements, including in large regional centres with no public system dentists.
"It's a bit worrying because the need is there whether there is a dentist or not," he said.
The La Trobe student is one of a rising number of rural people studying dentistry in Bendigo and wants to take his skills back to hometown Swan Hill, or a similar community, once he graduates.
Mr Hughes sees it as a way of giving back to communities that shaped him into the person he is today.
"It's all well and good having the Melbourne students go on rural rotations and say 'oh yeah, it might be good to spend a couple of years here once I graduate', but I think there is a different level of passion among people who want to return to the communities of their youth," he said.
"They are going to be there more long term and see it as a more stable sort of option."
Reform a priority, government says
A federal health department spokesperson said future funding decisions on clinical placements and educators would be a question for governments.
"In relation to dental reform, Health Ministers have made dental policy reform a priority and are considering funding reform options," they said.
A dental reform oversight group was developing options for sustainable, longer term funding and expected to make recommendations later in the year, the spokesperson said.
Traditionally, the federal government supported states, territories and private operators with dental funding, which the spokesperson said continued to be the case.
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Tom O'Callaghan
I grew up in Bendigo and I want to tell your stories.
I grew up in Bendigo and I want to tell your stories.
