Current and historical involvement of dentistry in child protection and a glimpse of the future.

Dental teams have been involved with child protection for over 40 years. This brief review summarises their involvement in the detection of various types of child abuse and goes on to discuss the gap between the proportions of dental professionals who suspect child abuse or neglect in their paediatric patients and those who refer such cases on. Potential reasons for this discrepancy are discussed, and a glimpse of the future is given as to where further research may be necessary to tackle this existing gap.