Live in Spain and be a dentist in London one day a week: “I win up to eight times more”

«It is a good beating: in total step ten or eleven hours going and coming, twice as much time working, but compensates me hundred percent. In England you can win up to eight times more than in Spain, ”acknowledges this 29 -year -old dentist with an advanced implantology. The rest of the week is distributed between a clinic in Boadilla del Monte and another in Ciudad Real. It will continue like this “while the body endures.”

Like Guillermo, other Spanish dentists, many with a similar profile -around thirty and without family loads -make lightning trips to countries such as England, France, Ireland and even Arab Emirates. They travel, do their job one, two or three days and become. They are paid more than here. For a working day in London, Guillermo receives a fixed of 1,500 pounds -change, more than 1,700 euros, the monthly salary of many Spaniards. In Madrid it goes percentage and earns between 200 and 300 euros per day. “Every time I see more very prepared companions who do the same as me,” he says.

One of them is Pablo Grau. It is the same age as Guillermo and the same specialty. For a year and a half he combines his work in three clinics in Madrid with which he carries out a couple of days a week, twice a month, in a town near Canterbury, east of London. Both were encouraged to take airplanes to hear the experience in the British capital of a teacher. Although Grau stays in a rental apartment, I also rent. For a job like yours, four days of seven hours each, a dentist charges in the United Kingdom between 5,000 and 7,000 pounds, which is equivalent to about 6,000-8,300 euros, three times more than in Spain. In addition, “working in another country is a new experience, you know another culture and improvements,” he explains.

One year of paperwork

Before Brexit, Great Britain was the most requested destination by dentists who wanted to work abroad, either sporadically or to establish itself, but now the bureaucratic maze has caused France, Germany or Italy to opt for more. Whatever the extension of the stay, the candidates must meet a series of requirements that depend on each country. Grau spent “a year with paperwork” to get the work visa: a certificate of good conduct was requested, issued by the General Council of Dentists in Spain, a certificate of penalties, a European recognition of the title of dentist, approve an exam of English C1, civil liability insurance and collaborate in the United Kingdom. “As I had the work there, it was easier to add points to accept the visa,” he says.

If in 2020 the General Council of Dentists issued 774 certificates of good conduct (do not distinguish between those asked to live there or to travel promptly), in 2023 there were more than a thousand. The reason is, mainly, the precariousness of the profession in Spain. «We are more than 41,000 dentists and more than 2,000 new graduates every year between public and private universities. Or you install your own clinic or work on behalf of frankly low wages, ”explains Óscar Castro Kingdom, president of the corporation.

In his opinion, the idea implemented in the popular imaginary of the dentist as a professional with an enviable, rich salary, a ‘great game’ -«You who deserve a prince, a dentist», who sang María Jiménez -, has disappeared in our country. He blames it for «the opening of so many dentistry faculties. If you have the money to pay a registration in a private one -the cutting note is very high in the public -, you already have your title ». To this is added the arrival of the big dental chains, some ‘low cost’, with part -time employees.

The most affected are younger professionals, “who charge a percentage 600 or 700 euros, often hired as false freelancers, without the right to leave due to illness, vacations or seniority in the company. Some live in conditions of pseudosclavitude, with work guidelines and remuneration that in many cases do not arrive to pay gasoline. Who can become independent like this? Half of the new graduates want to leave because they do not see future here, ”adds Castro Kingdom.

Although Spain is the only country in Europe where the specialties in dentistry are not recognized -in the United Kingdom there are eight -and must be hired as generalists, professionals trained in our country have “an excellent level,” says the president of the Council. So much that «there is rivalry between countries for taking them and in some cases they even offer them facilities such as housing, displacement expenses or classes to learn the language, in addition to unbeatable economic conditions: in Great Britain, they offer 2,500 pounds (3,000 euros) for start working without work experience ».

«We have good reputation. We do things very well and we are also quite workers, ”says Guillermo, formed, like Grau, in King Juan Carlos in Madrid. “In a clinic in London in which I was previously, five dentists, four were Spanish and another was Moroccan but had studied in Spain,” he adds.

Very requested

If these professionals are required by other countries, it is not only because of their great competition, but also because they are needed. If in Spain there is a dentist for 1,100 inhabitants, in the United Kingdom there is one for every 3,000. In Spain, more than twenty dentistry faculties (half private) work against eleven British for a slightly larger population.

“In the United Kingdom, professionals are needed in all areas of health: nurses, doctors, dentists … There are not so many specialized in what we do,” says Grau. However, Castro Kingdom believes that this situation will be reversed sooner or later when the supply surpasses the demand.

In the United Kingdom, dentists can work at the National Health Service or NHS (the National Health Service), questioned every year for being a deficit, with a huge workload and whose treatments are often ended in failure, or in the private system , much better valued for its results but also much more expensive. «Orthodontics is paid double or tripe: an endodontics, a treatment that is generally resolved in a visit, costs between 1,300 and 1,800 euros, of what the specialist takes half. In Spain, they can ask for 200 euros, up to 500 if it is a very recognized specialist, ”says Marta Suárez.

This Endodontics specialist, who studied at the International University of Catalonia, traveled from Barcelona to London 16 years ago to carry out a three -month research stay at the Guy’s Hospital, of King’s College. He was offered to cover a decline and stayed definitely. “I had no intention of doing so but in Spain, dental franchises had already been implemented, working conditions were worse and the cheapest treatments … I was not compensated to return,” he explains. He works in nine private clinics -in six of them he has Spanish colleagues -, from ten to two, from Monday to Thursday, working conditions that, he knows, would never have in Spain. Set in the city center and with four children, it has no intention of returning.

Nor does it surprise at all that Spanish professionals are used. «Our training exceeds English. We have nothing to envy them, ”he says. He knows it by good hand, he has taught for eleven years at King’s College. Of those who come and go, he says: “Some would compensate for working here one day and play golf for the rest of the week.”

Guillermo and Grau will continue to get early to take airplanes all the time they can, something that only plan to interrupt in the future for family conciliation issues. Both are clear that they will not end up definitively installed in England. The usual: the weather, the few hours of light, the lifestyle … “I would not move for anything,” Guillermo confirms.