Tooth problem - and costs of private treatment

pboae

I'm posting on behalf of a friend who is having a dental nightmare. She had a root canal done a little over a year ago, it wasn't finished she was left with a temp filling and then the dentist closed down. A few months later the tooth broke, but it wasn't painful (presumably it was dead after the root canal). It's the first proper molar on the bottom right.

Now she can't get another NHS dentist, and she keeps getting infections around the broken tooth. Once it reaches that stage she can see the emergency dentist and gets anti biotics, but they won't take the broken tooth out. It's now infected again (the 4th time in about 6 months).

She's in a small amount of pain now, but the emergency dentist won't see her until it is really painful, and then she'll be able to get anti biotics, but presumably this is just going to keep happening, and it can't be good to have all these infections?

She is thinking about trying to go private to get it removed, but she can't get credit, and doesn't have the money to pay up front. Will private dentists do payment plans? If not I suppose she'll have to carry on like this for a while until she can save the money up.

Does anyone know how much it would cost? Does she have any other options? She doesn't get benefits but earns very little.

Toothsmith

Has she tried contacting her local PCT? They will have a list of local NHS dentists.

Even if some aren't taking on NHS patients, they might be contracted to provide certain emergency sessions.

Also, if she's also in South Yorkshire, is she anywhere near Sheffield Dental Hospital?

That might be worth a try.

whatatwit

Could she not exagerrate the pain a bit and ask that after the anti-biotics course, she return and they extract the tooth.
I understand that usually they won't extract whilst there is an infection. Surely if the dentist closed part way through her treatment, then the PCT should have ensured that the treatment was finished.

(stop laughing Toothsmith , I can hear you from here)

alison999

they cant extract the tooth while theres unfection because it wont go numb. it wouldnt be THAT expensive to have the tooth out privatly, id GO IN to a few local practices and see what information you can get from them. can any of her friends or family recommened any dentists to her?

pboae

She's not near me, she is north of Manchester. PCT have basically told her there aren't any NHS dentists (or rather none that are taking on patients) within travelling distance. It seems to be a catch-22 while it's infected they can't extract it (totally understand that) but once the infection has cleared it's not an emergency anymore and then they won't see her at all (until it happens again).

I guess that if she had forced the point when it first happened (when it wasn't finished) then they would have had to do something, but as it wasn't hurting and seemed to be OK, she just left it. Though the tooth could have broken anyway.

Could she get away with pretending to live at my house and going to Sheffield Dental Hospital?

I've suggested going in to ask, or even just ringing for a quote, but she is really embarrased about being so skint. I'd like to get a ballpark figure so she's got some idea what to expect, because if it's way more than she can afford, there's no point me pushing her to go and get quotes.

cheap_charlie

There are dental hospitals in Manchester - has she tried them?

Toothsmith

There is A dental hospital in Manchester.

Some of the countries very best dentists qualified there!

SuziQ

I thought it was posted on here a few weeks back,that we are no longer 'registered' with an NHS dentist,so that now you can go to any NHS dentist and take the first appt they have? I'll see if I can find the thread as there was a lot of info on there.

Amended-I can't search back further than June and I'm pretty sure the discussion was in May.

Toothsmith

That's exactly right.

Dentists with NHS contracts have to see anybody wanting NHS treatment - providing they have the 'capacity' to treat them.

That word 'capacity' can sometimes have a bit of a loose defenition though.

Getting in touch with the PCT to see who has 'capacity' is often better than ringing round NHS dentists every day though.

bank_of_slate

When you say that the dentist 'shut down' was it that the dentist retired or was shut down urgently and without notice?

In normal circumstances the practice has a moral obligation to ensure that all patients who were under treatment at the time were catered for either before the dentist shut or handed over by a prior arrangement to another dental practice during the dentist's normal 3 month notice period.

If it was an urgent and unforseen shut down then the PCT were responsible for ensuring all the patients under current treatment were taken care of!

I would contact the PALS department of the PCT to enquire and possibly complain about the situation.

If you are still not satisfied with the outcome then it may be worth contacting the Healthcare Commission.
...Linda xx

pboae

She's going to try the Manchester Dental Hospital on Monday (they don't do out of hours) thanks all :-)

EDIT: sorry I forgot to find out how it shut down, I will ask next time.