AIBU to complain after NHS dentist did filling for my 16 year-old?

What is the process removing anew one and replacing with a white filling ? Going through similar with my 14 year old and want it changed asap

I cannot believe you’re complaining an NHS dentist managed to fit in treatment for your son. People are desperate to see dentists. I think you should do the decent thing and have all of your treatment done privately so that another family can benefit from the NHS. Also, he’s 16, not six. “Unprepared” for a tiny filling…

Children are free on the NHS so he wouldn’t be paying anything at all for the treatment so the bands are irrelevant.

A bit of an overreaction I’m afraid, he is 16. The dentist was doing their job.
Does a local anaesthetic not mean it was a sizeable area of decay? It’s really not that painful….and I hate a dentist visit!!
Have the filling replaced with a white one if you and son feel strongly about this.
Don’t upset your NHS dentist unless you want to find a new one.

I’m a dental hygienist and recently had an amalgam filling. It’s a huge filling in a back tooth and composite fillings have failed twice. In some cases amalgam is totally fine. It really isn’t the devil. It is often far more long lasting for back teeth.

OP I would also be very careful with making a complaint. I’m not saying you can’t at all, but if you go in ranting and raving chances are the dentist could just tell you to go elsewhere in future and you’ll lose your NHS dentist. If you feel that strongly about it then by all means complain. I just wouldn’t go in too heavy handed if you want to remain a patient of the practice.

Did he not have his phone with him? I understand he may have felt pressured to say yes but surely he could have said I need to ring my Mum to let her know, or ring you after the injection while waiting for it to numb. Did he have means to pay the difference, as he would have been expecting to pay a check up fee and a filling would be the next payment band would it not?

I would maybe speak with the practice if it makes you feel better but I don’t think it’s formal complaint worthy. Be cautious that your own feelings about how it looks don’t influence his, silver fillings don’t look that bad.

As a side note, and general observation- why go to AI to ask this question?

Would you like help drafting a formal complaint letter to the practice manager once you see what the consensus is on your post?

Oh dear I'm cringing for you!

He's 16. He can consent to his own medical treatment. If you haven't prepared him for that level of independence and responsibility that's on you. Time to catch him up!

So you were fine with your son going to the dentist by himself, but now that the dentist has done some really quite minor dentisty stuff it's imperative that you should have been there because of the scourge of dodgy dentists that apparently blights the country. Complain if you like but it'll only achieve 2 things: you looking a bit mad, and you not having a dentist. And FFS don't include the AI prompt and suggested follow-up actions.

I’m guessing the dentist presumed you were happy from him to make his own decisions given you sent him alone.

I’m with you OP, amalgam fillings look gross and are not great. I’d go back and complain and get them replace it with white. Nobody in my home country gets them as long as they can afford white fillings.

He’s self conscious about a filling? Really??

At 16 he can consent to fillings, if you didn't think he was capable then you should have gone with him. I do find it weird that the nhs still uses amalgam fillings, they use composite as standard where I live now.

I’ll trust the dentist’s judgement and your son is only self conscious because you’ve drawn attention and kicked off about a very simple filling on a back tooth. He’s a man not a toddler. You’re not clever as you’ve had to use ChatGPT to write your post! I bet you’ll use that to write a complaints letter too. You can’t even write.

@Claryyy if your son wasn't confident enough to even phone you or make his own decision or say no then as a parent you should have gone with him to the dentist.

Its just a filling.

Maybe use a private dentist next time

No shit Sherlock.

I can see why you’re annoyed about the lack of discussion.

But I wouldn’t communicate your feelings to your son as it may make him feel more upset about it than he needs to be. It is just a filling. It’s at the back of his mouth so no one will notice it. No one likes fillings, but they do prevent our teeth rotting and falling out. I’d be trying to get him to move on and not make a big thing of it. He can always get it removed and replaced with a white filling when he’s older if he wants to.

As your AI has suggested , it can help you write a letter of complaint if you want to.

How obvious can a filling in a back molar be, unless you walk round all day with a mouth like a yawning hippo?

NHS dentists are like hen's teeth the op should be grateful she has one and they did the job quickly. If they are happy to pay and want more personalised service they should go private altogether and let someone else have that NHS slot.

The whole thing is AI generated the last paragraph is AI asking what the op wants it to do next.

I think you’re in the wrong for not going with him. If you don’t think he’s capable of dealing with the possibilities arising during a dentist appointment - one of which is the need for further treatment - you shouldn’t have let him go alone.

At 16, it's not gillick conpentancy, the Mental Capacity Act starts at 16. The dentist would have had to follow the guidelines of this Act with the starting point being assumed capacity unless there was any reason not to such as a learning disabilty, and then he would have to assess his capacity, making a best interest decision if he lacked capacity.

Legally the dentist has not done anything wrong.

Having said that, I would have been sad that my 16 year old was in that position to have to make that decision alone, and it sounds like the dentist may not have told him he could go private for a white filling etc.

It sounds like your child struggled to assert himself and say he wanted time to think about it and call you to discuss etc understandable, many 16 year olds would, and therefore, like previous posters have said, I would have explained to my child if threy were going alone that they can ring me if they needed to discuss any procedures. Better still i would have been with them so they can pop out and discuss it with me before agreeing.

With your child's consent you could raise some concerns that the dentist didn't explain all the options, and rushed him ti make a decision etc but you cannot complain that they completed the procedure without your consent.

I think this is a harsh lesson in parenting unfortunately. You allowed your son to go alone but didn’t prepare him for the situation. I understand that it was unexpected. Tell him next time, he’s to tell the dentist he needs to talk to a parent.

Hmmm - yeah. If indeed it needed filling!

I'm with the OP on this one. I had a filling done at around the same age and that tooth continued to be troublesome until I had it removed several root fillings/crown/antibiotics later

There was zero problems with it originally, and no, I do not trust dentists to always do the right thing. I have no other fillings in any other teeth and hadn't had any up until that time when I was around 15.