to leave my dentist and cancel payments?

[Portakalkedi]

Been with private dentist for less than a year. When I joined I told them about a problem, old filling which was giving me some pain and sensitivity, so this was redone. Made no difference, told her, she put some coating on it, again made no difference, then she admitted it would have to be redone. Eventually had this redone, but it is in fact worse than at the beginning. So I've had months of pain and sensitivity, and have paid £200 for this (in addition to the monthly fees). They tried to charge me full price for the second go but I said the cost of the first one should be taken off and it grudgingly was. Not surprisingly I don't trust them to do it a third time so wish to leave them. AIBU to cancel the payments? And is it possible they would pursue me for this? I will also have to pay another dentist to redo this job for the third time, plus cost of another new patient exam, x rays etc.

Presumably you have a contract payment plan? If you want to refuse further payment based on substandard work you would need the opinion of another dentist / subsequent dental records confirming that the work done by your current dentist was substandard or negligent or not best practice and that it should have been done differently. Without that, your current dentist will take the stance that there’s always a risk of failure with any restorative dental work (there is) and they provided the indicated treatment correctly.

Thanks, but surely the fact that the first filling too was immediately unsuccessful would say that the work was substandard. I''ve had many fillings over the years and have never experienced this. There is also another issue which was poorly dealt with, but this second filling failure means I have no wish to let them near my teeth again.

It may mean that it was substandard, but you aren’t personally qualified to make that assessment - hence why visiting another dentist and obtaining their opinion is going to be required. If the filling needs to be redone again anyway, and you want to use a different dentist, they’ll tell you whether it was or not.

I had a tooth at the back of my mouth which had rotted. The private dentist charged my 400 to put a temporary filling in, didn't listen when I said I could feel them drilling and it was painful, and for me to return in 2 weeks to have it fully sorted. (at a huge expense). I asked if it were easier to have the tooth removed as it's just a chewing tooth and there are plenty of teeth round it (Not had any other dentist work in 30 years and the resst of my teeth were fine). 3 days after they'd done that filling, my gum became septic, they said that dentists don't do that anymore. I I decided at that time to go down to Boots who had a SmileRight dentist in store. I spoke to them for a second opinion, who said firstly we need to sort the septic,but there and then the dentist said that I might find it better to have the tooth taken out completely. Week later, £50 of tooth pulling, with the dentist applying 3 packs of local anaesthetic to make damn sure it was fully numb I had that tooth taken out.
All I can say, to you for advice, id that you entered a contract (payment plan), so you do have to pay for the work you had done, UNLESS you can proove it wasn't upto scratch. Otherwise yeah, they (or more to the point the payment plan people will go after you). However I would suggest going to a high street dentist. (As I say I went to SmileRight for mine), and get a second opinion at the very least. I think it's like opticians. Most people use to go to a private small practice optician, but the quality of service was no better than SpecSavers or OptiicalExpress and would usually cost more. If you have a great dentist then stick with them.
If you find that you are paying no interest in the payment plan (like my Ex Dentist) then they are just loading the cost upfront.
Dental Hygenists are (for me) a massive con. If I have something wrong, why isn't my dentist telling me? The hygenist themselves gets paid an absolute fraction of the bill.

I had the same thing happen with a replaced filling. An old filling was replaced and it wouldnt settle. The filling was redone and it still wouldnt settle. It turned out that I was literally gritting my teeth. It had become a habit and I never noticed I was doing it. The more I worried about the tooth, the more I clenched. Outside eating your top and bottom teeth should not be touching. Once the dentist realised what was happening I managed to stop myself doing it during the day and wore a specially made tooth splint at night because it turned out I clenched in my sleep too. Yes, it can just be one tooth that hurts if you're a clencher or grinder. Once that was under control, the filling settled. I personally know somebody who had a couple of unnecessary root canals before they discovered the cause of the pain was her habit of clenching her teeth.

I know tooth grinding can be a problem, but after both fillings the pain came back the same day, on drinking water, brushing teeth etc, before even going to sleep. I'm pretty sure I don't grind my teeth, I have the opposite problem in trying to keep my mouth closed at night.

You might need a root canal instead of another filling to deal with the nerve damage that has caused the pain from the start.

Of course you are free to look for a new dentist if you aren't happy with your current provider but they did provide a service and you do owe them for it.

But a dentist should know this and spot it on examination/x rays.

The long and the short of it is that the finance company who you have a credit agreement with for the payment plan will pursue you for the debt if you stop paying. They won’t accept you saying “I think the work wasn’t done properly so I shouldn’t have to pay.” You need the dental surgery to acknowledge that the work was substandard or negligent and refund / agree for the finance to be cancelled. If the dentist who did the work denies this, you need another dentist’s professional opinion.

I suspect this will be confounded because this wasn’t a perfect tooth to begin with, but a tooth which had previously decayed and been treated by another dentist, which then required further repair.