AIBU to think that dentists are using covid as an excuse to refuse to take on NHS patients while the same practices will happily take on new private patients?

[ohcarolina2001]

I moved house to a new area just after lockdown with a new baby. Obviously I haven't been able to try to register with a new NHS dentist until recently as they have been closed due to covid.

Now that they are opening up again I used the NHS website to identify local NHS dentists who are supposedly taking on new patients and rang up loads of them, only to be told they aren't taking on new NHS patients at the moment but are taking on new private patients! One even said they would only register my baby (who doesn't have teeth yet!) for NHS dentistry if I joined the practice as a private fee paying patient, which I find absolutely outrageous!

I resent paying for private dentistry since NHS dentistry is subsidised (or free for some people like myself with my maternity exemption certificate) and is perfectly good enough in my experience. I mean they all qualified as dentists and I don't need a perfect Hollywood smile, just healthy teeth!

I am concerned about my teeth as they haven't been checked since mid pregnancy and I am now nearly 6 months postpartum, and teeth are more vulnerable during and after pregnancy. I also lost part of a filling last week so would like to be seen soon (I appreciate I may need to join a waiting list while they deal with more urgent cases and the backlog of existing patients not seen during lockdown) but I am loathe to give in to greedy CF dentists who should be providing NHS services to the British public but are using covid as an excuse to take on more private patients and leave those who can't afford private services with nothing. Is this not hugely discriminatory?

Exasperated, I rang up the NHS England number which is meant to help you if you are having trouble finding NHS dentistry and explained my predicament. I think the person on the line revealed too much as she actually told me that I can't get drilling done as an NHS patient now, but only as a private patient. I don't mind paying any additional costs for PPE for drilling due to covid, but don't see how it's fair that I should have to go private to get the treatment I need. I mean, either drilling is safe or unsafe: there shouldn't be drilling for the rich but not for the poor, right?!

YANBU - dentists are being CFs and the poor are getting screwed as usual
YABU - dentists can charge what they like, the NHS can't force them to provide NHS services, and your teeth can rot in hell if you can't afford private.

@RobinHumphries

* However, the NHS contract says that if a dental practice (not the one dentist allocated to nhs patients), if the practice offers a service privately it must also be available to nhs patients under nhs conditions.

Anything else is fraud and a breach of contract. Please report to the GDC and the CCG.*

Completely wrong. There are services not available on the NHS but are allowed privately - any kind of cosmetic work for a start, implants, teeth straightening on adults

If the dentist says the work is clinically necessary, the NHS will fund the treatment.

My sister was told she needed a deep clean but the NHS wouldn't pay for it, so the only optionwas private. Took a call to the practice manager and quoting regs before they stopped offering either private or a referral to the dental hospital.

@iolaus

Have to say my (NHS) dentist has been great - when the one I saw (head of the surgery) rang out of her NHS quota for the year - think it was January, when my appointment was due they gave me the choice of either seeing her privately or switching to a new dentist in the practice under NHS. DH, the 4 kids (2 of which are adults) and I are all with the practice as NHS patients but spread over 3 or 4 different dentists (I think one of the girls switched from one they saw as a child)

At the moment they are only seeing those with problems in general though - they rang my 16 year old this week to say his check up was due but they are saying that if he has no problems does he mind waiting as they are getting through the back log of those who contacted them with problems throughout lockdown or who are havign pain first.

I contacted them during lockdown as had major toothache and they said unfortunately all they could do was either give antibiotics for an absess or extract the tooth - I was in so much pain I said they would have to extract it but they asked if I would try stronger pain killers for 24-48hours first and prescribed them - pain went. When they reopened they rang me the Monday or the Tuesday asking if I wanted to come in and be seen

I do think some push the private patients more than others - ours has a couple of partners (who also have private) but always has several newly qualified dentists who (I think) just do NHS - they stay for a year or two then go to a different practice and you get a new NHS dentist

@iolaus You are registered with the practice not a specific dentist. Your dentist should have continued to treat you if there were UDAs left for you to be treated by someone else at the practice.

This was a way to move your care to a more junior member of staff or encourage you to go private.

Very difficult times for everyone just now. Dentists have gotten a rough deal. We are scoring too in the charts for the most riskiest profession just now.
Our practices were asked to shut mid May. We got a percentage of our NHS income but private income went to zero. We still had staff and bills and overheads to pay, and due to being NHS partially funded we couldn't utilise the furlough scheme and didn't qualify for any government grants.
Here in Scotland the SDR ( NHS rules/regs/pricing document) was amended, meaning we were no longer able to charge patients for treatments and we are limited to urgent care only. I suppose technically we could take on new patients but we would have to do this for free. We wouldn't get an extra penny for this.
Not our decision. Not our rules. Please don't blame us.
We don't have quite the same restrictions for private care. We can source our own masks and PPE ( the stuff that the NHS has provided us about ten years out of date, so most dentists are wary about using it). We can do agps for private patients. After the procedure we need to shut the room down for an hour in order to allow fallow time and fresh air to enter the room before we give it a deep clean.
This process, plus the need to work in staff bubbles and encouraging social distancing has meant our footfall of patients has fallen to about one fifth maybe, of what it used to be pre-Covid.
We have had to make three staff members redundant. We have put our business loans and mortgages on hold. We are unsure whether or not we will still have a business in a few months.

So many typos! Meant to read we are scoring TOP in the charts for most riskiest business and we had to close our surgeries mid MARCH not May! 😂 sorry

I think people are finally starting to realise just what 10+ years of Tory government is doing

It was like this in the Blair/Brown years too.

OP - have you moved a really long way from your old NHS dentist, or could you go back there for routine appointments?