to think severe pain is just that - whatever's causing it and to refuse help is disgraceful?

[youarekidding]

Will try and be brief. Have had an experience lately (friend and her DD) which made me question the NHS 'care' - when or 10 days a child was brushed off with a 'virus' (temp, rash, not eating) to be eventually blue lighted to hospital with strep pneumonia and suspected cause was untreated scarletina.

So this week I have had a bad tooth - given AB by OOH dentist after just tapping tooth, then own dentist upped the dose after another night of no sleep. After another night of no sleep and severe jaw pain caused by the nerve, constant vomiting and body spasms caused by nerve pain I went to A&E as pain couldn't be controlled. They didn't want to know as 'dental pain' and referred me back to the dentist. When I turned up there the dentsit was in the state that they had sent me away. She gave me aneasthetic in the nerve and put a dressing on the nerve in the tooth but I was in so much pain she said if it didn't work she'd refer me to dental care at hospital (maxillo). So the aneasthetic wore off and severe pain, sickness etc returned. She rang maxillo who said I could only attend as an emergency through A&E so was sent there and dentist rang to inform A&E I would be on my way and was for maxillo referral.
2 1/2 hours after arriving saw dental surgeon who was a patronising arse - telling me why hadn't I tried antiemetic for sickness, putiron, alternating painkillers regulary. Obviously I had tried painkillers correctly but he kept going on about how my dentist couldn't have contacted maxillo, how she was lying and that they are always referring the cases they couldn't be bothered to deal with. BTW this wasn't the case my dentist was concerned about how ill I was.

So I go home again and ring my own dentist who said to pop back yesterday to see her if it hadn't settled. It had and I went to work, rang dentist who agreed dressing and AB obviously working. Until 9pm last night.

Cue the most horrendous pain - vomiting continuosly, and vilontly, body spasming, and me screaming in pain. I took antiemetic, omeprezole, dioryolyte, puriton, painkillers and AB (when I'd stopped vomming) but unable o control the pain or spasms. My friend tried OOH dentist (none after 9pm), OOH GP, NHS direct (5 hr call back for dental nurse) but no-one would help because it's 'just dental pain'.

I turned up at dentist at 8.15am - they don't open until 8.30am, they took one look at me and opened up and took me in, gave me lucozade (serious BS problems by this point), aneasthetic in nerve and he was concerned my body was going into shock. He then spent 2 hours removing the tooth and stitching me up. The dentist who does the Thursday emergency clinic works at the hospital normally and was they had left me Tuedsay in the state I was in and allowed it to continue. I have also been given a muscle relaxant to stop the spasming!!

So AIBU to think pain and resulted illness should be treated and the source of the pain is sometimes irrelevant and that as a hospital does have dentists they shouldn't refuse to complete dental care. Basically I became needlessly ill because of the lack of basic care.

Just dental pain? From the state you were in, it obviously wasn't just anything! I remember having dental pain (not on your scale) increasing over the pain of a week and a bit. Tried painkillers, oil of cloves, stronger painkillers. I remember standing at the counter in Boots practically begging for the strongest over-the-counter painkillers they could sell me.

'Phoned surgery, usual dentist not in, the receptionist (bless her) said she could tell I was in some distress and if I could get there as soon as, one of the other dentists would see me. I sat in the waiting room in tears, rocking back and forth on a chair. The other woman in the waiting room looked slightly worried for her safety!

The dentist was fantastic. He found the tooth causing the problem and injected the gum to numb the area. He said he could tell from the look of relief on my face he'd found the problem tooth. He took it out and everything was right again. Well, apart from then being prescribed penicillin (no previous problems) but then a day or so later having a massive allergic reaction, anaphylatic shock and being blue-lighted to hospital. That was a fun couple of weeks.

I'm glad that you finally got it sorted. Agree that complaining is the way to go.

I'd flag it up to your MP and see if there is a Royal COllege of Dentists or some other dental organization and see if you can make a complaint through them as well, and raise the issue of what should you do if you are in such incredibly bad pain as if you did this to an animal you would have the RSPCA down your neck, animal taken away for not being looked after right and yet it's fine to treat a person like this...

good luck and hope all traces of dental pain is well gone...

There is a real issue about how we help people manage complex neuropathic pain in an emergency. As you say painkillers make no differences and it can seem like no one understands the situation if you just get the 'alternate ibuprofen and paracetamol' mantra everywhere.

Somewhere on the NHS website (cannot be arsed to find the link now) one of the tips for caring for a dental abscess whilst waiting to see a dentist is not to floss the abscessed tooth. Obviously someone who has never had one wrote that. Presumably elsewhere it advises people that if you think you are having a heart attack you shouldn't thrust a breadknife through your chest to check and if you are worried a lump may be cancerous don;t just burn it off with a cigarette lighter. Mind you they still say try a bath and 2 paracetamol when you ring the labour ward (I wonder how many people blink and try to clarify matters 'I'm sorry I'm not really sure you quite appreciate the situation, I've got another human being trapped in my fanjo.').

It makes such a difference where you are. I had a horrendous experience a few years ago where, due to extensive traveling over the Christmas period, I ended up seeing no less then 4 different emergency dentists in North Wales, Yorkshire, and Holland. The North Wales one was lovely but was running a mobile clinic without x-ray facilities and thus could only treat what he could see. The York one was great but hesitant to poke at the treatment started by the Welsh one. One of the Dutch ones needs to be struck off, frankly, and the second one was great. I ended up having to go private on return to the UK to have it fixed permanently as there isn't an NHS dentist accepting patients in 30 miles. Cost an absolute fortune but they are so, so great. I phoned them up in tears from pain late one Friday afternoon right before they closed and they not only squeezed me in before closing time but actually sent over the receptionist in her car to collect me so I could get to the surgery before the dentist went home for the weekend.

The royal colleges will take no interest. You need to speak to the PCT or PALS.

You need to write to your local Patient Advice and Liason Service (PALS)
www.pals.nhs.uk/cmsContentView.aspx?ItemID=932

or directly to the local NHS Hospital Trust where the A&E dept refused to carry out any treatment.

Seems to me that the dentist did what they could, so the only reason to write to the PCT would be to clarify the arrangements about who should be doing what - assumimg your dentist is an NHS one.

PALS would cover both angles - NHS dentist and hospital