Asked for Dental NHS Scale and Polish.Told "Go to Hygienist at £25 extra"

jugglebug

brook2jack wrote: »

Try volunteering for bridge2aid or one of the other organisations. It really refreshes your enthusiasm and reminds you yes you are doing good. The downside is as an associate you will have to save for a long time time to afford the donation to go (£2000 ish) but it gives you something really worthwhile to look forward to. The interview is interesting!

There is a legacy element too as you train dental aides to do simple extractions etc so there is some expertise left behind.
Mercyships also do similar jobs but for a longer time comittment and there is a Christian element.

Alternatively contact your nearest Chernobyl childrens link (may be ?Telford) the kids that come over have often not seen a dentist or had treatment without la and links are always grateful for help in providing dental treatment. Kids are as good as gold though not surprisingly terrified.

I used to help out with a chernobyl kids charity.
They would come over here for a holiday and get the likes of me filling / extracting their teeth. :eek:
Over the last 2 /3 years my BDA section has hosted events for both the Mercy ships and Bridge2Aid too. Very worthwhile organisations.
I didn't go to their presentations at BDA conference this year though as I was sad enough over other things. Didn't get the opportunity to chuck eggs at Andrew Lansley either :mad:

Oh and Booze, I am the one with the good fortune to be married to a hygienist, but I also have a welsh accent so I can understand the confusion between me and welshdent.

Pennylane

Lest we all get too carried away with all the poor overseas people ..... my friend is a foster carer.

She is currently looking after 2 girls (10 & 12) who have terrible teeth and who tell her they can't ever remember seeing a dentist. She took them for a check up at a dentists she had not been to before and she said he was awful. He spoke down to her and told the girls their teeth were like that from too many sweets, fizzy drinks and not cleaning them and it was their own fault. He was bolshy, impatient and quite rough.

When they'd finished she left the girls in the waiting room and went back in and told him that she hadn't wanted to cause a scene in front of them because she's only been caring for them a few weeks. She also pointed out that it had taken her a long time to get them to even agree to see a dentist and when they came to her they hadn't owned toothbrushes. He looked everso slightly flustered but didn't apologise and she's not going back to him.

Anyway, back to Dispatches.

brook2jack

In the USA they prosecute parents for child neglect who do not bring children in for treatment particularly when they have multiple decayed teeth.

Unfortunately in the UK there is still a sizeable chunk of the population who feel it is perfectly acceptable to let their children suffer toothache on a daily basis rather than make the changes which would sort their childrens pain out. Unfortunately this chunk of the population is not confined to those whose children are taken into care.

This doesn't excuse the dentists rudeness but reinforces toothsmiths advice only go to a dentist that has been recommended to you and you have visited. Particularly important with children as some dentists are better with kids than others.

boozercruiser

welshdent wrote: »

booze you have misunderstood a few points.

They are not under the supervision of an NHS dentist. They work to the prescription of a dentist. There are no NHS dentists in general practice. We are all private we just do contractual work for the NHS following the laid out regulations.

In order to receive treatment, NHS or otherwise; there must be a need for it therefore there must be a diagnosis. Legally a hygienist can not diagnose therefore can not treatment plan therefore can not carry out treatments on demand/request. Its not a stitch up its all part of GDC regs to protect the public.

The NHS only employs hygienists in hospital and community and they are usually the same as dentists in general practice - independent. They MAY be employed by the practice or they may work sessionally and paid for work done at an agreed fee scale. Depends on the arrangements.

They simply carry out treatment that is planned by the dentist. Now we arent going back over the whole BPE, gum disease, staining arguement but thats what it would come down to certainly in my hands. I write on the card - pt to see hygienist for X treatment.

Hello again Welshdent...actually it was Brook2Jack who said

"they are under the direct supervision of dentists" and not me.

You say "We are all private we just do contractual work for the NHS following the laid out regulations."

That would be just lovely if all NHS Dentists carried out those regulations. However a lot cobviously do not.

And thank you for clearly pointing out the exact relationship between a Dentist and the Hygienist.

Hygienists are clearly a very highly trained and of course very respected profession who obviously know all about the mouth and teeth, particularly in respect of gum disease/gingivitis. They are not stupid at all.

So when they are treating someone with gum disease who has been referred because of that it must follow that they KNOW if the NHS Dentist should have carried out that work or not.

The Dentist in the scenario I have been complaining about is the main scammer who is just passing the scam/rip off onto someone else to do his/her dirty work and both parties do very nicely thank you out of it.

I wait to see with great interest if tonights Channel 4 Prog. just confirms what I have suspected/known all along.

I do hope that my twitter post on the Channel 4 dentist entry leads to more point of views being posted here.

Either way....I will feel far more confident in challenging my Dentist if he/she tries to fob me off with treatment elsewhere at extra cost.

Power to the people!:D

boozercruiser

Juggleboog "Oh and Booze, I am the one with the good fortune to be married to a hygienist, but I also have a welsh accent so I can understand the confusion between me and welshdent."

I wasn't confusing you with Welshdent M8....I just couldn't remember exactly who had proudly announced that they had the good fortune to be married to a Hygienist. Nice one.

That must be lovely and very profitable for you both! LOL.....Still, I am being very serious when I say that you deserve any rewards there are in Dentistry after all you went through regarding your education and training etc. Believe it or not...I do actually feel very honoured that actual live Dentists are taking the time to bother responding to this now long and probably at times rather annoying thread.

Best Regards to you and the Missus

Boozercruiser.

I am very happy for you and I am sure of course that you are not part of what I am ranting about.

Pennylane

brook2jack wrote: »

In the USA they prosecute parents for child neglect who do not bring children in for treatment particularly when they have multiple decayed teeth.

Unfortunately in the UK there is still a sizeable chunk of the population who feel it is perfectly acceptable to let their children suffer toothache on a daily basis rather than make the changes which would sort their childrens pain out. Unfortunately this chunk of the population is not confined to those whose children are taken into care.

This doesn't excuse the dentists rudeness but reinforces toothsmiths advice only go to a dentist that has been recommended to you and you have visited. Particularly important with children as some dentists are better with kids than others.

At first I thought you were kidding - but you're not are you? Is that what dentistry has come to - even having to shop around for a dentist who can be pleasant to a child?:eek: I almost can't believe you said that.

I know you hang on Toothsmith's every word but he's talking out of his root canal on this one trust me. I've discussed with him before his notion of only going to a dentist who has been recommended to you and you have visited. He obviously doesn't live around here!

If you live in a rural area there is often no choice and very little public transport if you want to go further afield. When a new dentists opened up near us I called in, spoke to the receptionist (who was pretty average) and wasn't invited in to meet the dentist. You also don't get recommendations when its a new practice either.

My friend had to take these girls to this dentist because it is the only one in the town where the oldest girl goes to school. The younger child goes to school in the opposite direction where there is no dentist and she has to do over 45 miles each day just getting them to/from school. She's hardly likely to add to her mileage because Toothsmith suggests you visit the dentist beforehand is she?

brook2jack

That is precisely what I said. Some dentists have a natural empathy for children ,some dentists are excellent at making full dentures, some are excellent teachers. All should be polite , but being polite and having a natural connection to children so you can get them to trust you to do things which they may be very scared or apprehensive about are two different things. You may be the best dentist in the world and mum and dad or carer may love you but if you can't connect with the child you are useless as a childrens dentist.

Dentistry is a very personal thing. One dentists "style" may suit you and anothers may not. With children there are many dentists who specialise in paediatric dentistry and many who specialise in treating eg nervous children . One of those routes is the community service which is available in every part of the country and often is first port of call when carers need NHS dentistry for children in their care. I am sure your friend the foster carer is aware of this service because most social services will refer carers to this service.

I presume there is some choice about where your friend can take the children because otherwise surely they wouldn't contemplate leaving them with decay and holes and they are not going back to that dentist?

LittleMissMPB

Pennylane wrote: »

At first I thought you were kidding - but you're not are you? Is that what dentistry has come to - even having to shop around for a dentist who can be pleasant to a child?:eek: I almost can't believe you said that.

I have to take my daughter to a dentist who can be nice to children. Her first visit to a dentist scared the life out of her. She was 18months old (didn't get her first tooth till 14months), and nervous anyway. She wanted to sit on my knee but the dentist said no. Fair enough. So I try and encourage her to sit in the chair like a big girl and she was getting nervous and I think we may have caught the dentist on a bad day as he just spoke to her as though she was misbehaving, which made her cry and refuse to co-operate and we ended up leaving without her being seen. It doesn't take 2 minutes to reassure a scared child does it?

She does see a dentist now, we found one who is much better and let her come in with me a few times first to see me having a checkup so she could get to know him.

boozercruiser

After part 1 of channal 4 prog.:mad:

After part 2 of prog. Mad as above!

End of prog. As above!

I am suprised that the Scale and Polish rip off wasn't hardly mentioned. Though the theme of the program applied to it though.

brook2jack

Quite a few inaccuracies but actually fairly balanced.