ARGUMENTS about the improvements or otherwise to our health service have raged in this election campaign. But one sector of the NHS remains undeniably in crisis: dentistry.

It is not so long ago that the arrival of a new health service dentist in Scarborough saw hundreds of townsfolk queueing to sign up. This shocking scene llustrated the desperate need for a severely rationed but essential service.

In York, time and again we have reported how practices have opted out of the NHS, throwing patients off their lists.

It reached the stage where those wishing to have dental treatment were told to go private - or go elsewhere.

Finally we have a more positive story to report. York and Selby Primary Care Trust, long under fire over the problem, has drawn up a blueprint to end the shortfall in care.

Expansion plans would see another 30,000 patient places established in the trust's area. It is an ambitious programme, and necessarily so.

More than half of these new places will be shared between two "super" practices. Many patients, previously served by a local dentist, may have to travel further for a check-up at these centralised centres, which would hit elderly people and others with mobility problems.

But at long last we can see an end to North Yorkshire's dentistry deficit. And that will put a smile back on a lot of faces.

Updated: 11:34 Tuesday, May 03, 2005