ADAVB 2018/2019 Annual Report

A D A V B A N N U A L R E P O R T 2 0 1 8 / 1 9 | 3 President’s Foreword The Respect Public Dentistry campaign finally achieved its goal of a new enterprise bargaining agreement (EBA), notably a 19 per cent increase to public dentist wages over the next four years, with all hospitals and most community health centres (with the exception of one), signing onto the new agreement. The agreement includes $2000 pro rata for public dentists to spend on CPD and professional memberships. This is a good beginning for Victorian dentists in closing the wage gap compared with their interstate colleagues, and also a baseline to ensure other dentists are not being under-remunerated when working for other corporations. The Australian Dental Association Victorian Branch (ADAVB) and Professionals Australia will continue to work closely to ensure that the entitlements in the agreements are realised, and that future agreements are fair and recognise our public members’ contribution to the Victorian community. Our continuing professional development (CPD) program continues to expand and diversify to meet our members’ varied interests in education. From more conventional programs such as master classes in resin bonding, to ‘Night at the Museum’ and ‘Al dente: Teeth, tortellini and tall tales’, members have been well educated as well as entertained! Attendance for all types of CPD has increased, and we will continue to explore new ideas and reinvigorate our CPD program with the guidance of the energetic CPD Committee and staff. Accreditation and compliance remained popular topics throughout the year. CPR and emergency management, practice management and accreditation, compliance in privacy and infection control programs were well attended by members and their staff. We continued our CPD bursary offering with the generous support of BOQ Specialist, this time with two bursaries available – a $10,000 CPD practice bursary and a $5000 recent graduate bursary. Our CPD events commenced with our 2018 ADAVB Convention that had more than 800 delegates attending an extensive, varied and informative program. The ADAVB members’ lounge was a great opportunity to speak to members and receive feedback and suggestions, as well as free coffee! The overall feedback about the program and events was very positive and I look forward to our next ADAVB Convention in 2020. As well as providing our members with quality and varied CPD events, we held a number of enjoyable social events such as the social dinner at Arc One Gallery, Cumulus Inc., the Recent Graduates Cocktail Night, and the popular tennis, golf and fly-fishing events.