Bogus Diagnosis
This review was recently posted on Google reviews and by the 25/7/23 was rendered invisible, presumably by the owner/operators to other people reading their reviews.
21/7/23 I have been a patient at the Chislehurst branch since 2014 or so. I attended a pre-booked routine NHS examination.
My usual experience has been to have what feels like all the 'gaps' between each tooth probed with an instrument and the dentist call out the number/name of every single tooth for logging by the assistant.This did not happen and no previous dental work was called for the assistant to log.
There was almost no examination except for several teeth, close to where work was required and not for them all. The examination stopped at the point where faults requiring work were found. The dentist made a vague remark about the possibility of potential decay under the gum, but did not examine all my gums.
I was not too pleased with the slight ambience of annoyance when I asked one or two questions.
When I was offered the choice of silver NHS or more expensive (more than three times the price) composite white fillings, my comment about not being comfortable with more metal fillings was met with silence.
Some information or advice would have been welcome, but I had had just chosen the more expensive option. There are disadavantages to silver fillings and composite ones but the dentist gave no advice.
I was not shown my X-Rays and although the practice has imaging capability, no pictures of the problem areas were taken. I was given a mirror so that I could see one tiny dark mark on each tooth.
As I am not qualified this meant almost nothing to me. I have since cleaned these teeth very thoroughly and can see nothing out of the ordinary. During the consultation the dentist said that these cavities had been caught early.
As I was leaving I asked if my crown was OK and I was told it was fine even though the dentist had gone nowhere near it.
I have subsequently discovered that not all cavities progress to require treatment. This was not stated at all by the dentist. Even if they considered that was not the case, I think that meantioning it as a possibility would have been more informative.
When I cancelled the pending work a few hours' later, the receptionist told me that the practice is charged by the service provider for cancellations. I am not in the habit of cancelling credit/debit card payments, however one pre-payment by credit card I did cancel recently showed a £7.50 charge to me for a very similar amount, made for both the transaction and the cancellation. The receptionist did not even know what the charge was.
The incident over the refund fees, involved a conversation with their colleague, loudly expressed for all to hear and repeated several times with a pretence of good humour. This offensive behaviour compounded my feeling of simply wanting to leave. I was not even disagreeing with the receptionist.
It clearly would have been pointless to openly discuss the other issue issue of a £460 quotation for two fillings for two incipient cavities, as possibly excessive and I was relieved that I had not talked about it. The cost of a composite filling has literally increased by £100 at this practice since since 2018-19. I object to providing the practice a gross income of nearly £700 per hour. My subsequent research into pricing shows that this quotation would be typical for a large cavity.
I am not in the habit of criticising people as they do their work. I am also tolerant of genuine errors and lapses.
Unfortunately I lost confidence in the dentist because of their omission to impart ordinary information about the relative benefits of treatments and the matter of the incomplete check-up. Silence and a lack of spontaneous information is highly disconcerting for me.
I always choose private dental work aside from the NHS checkup. The check-up this time was used as a vehicle to quickly find some work to generate a fee, otherwise a badly-paid imposition for this dentist.
It was my error to agree to the work and then cancel a little later, but also my right to change my mind. The refund incident completely confirmed my poor impression and decision to find another dentist.
I am happy to pay any refund charges within reason and at my discretion if the practice wishes me to. I am not seeking any kind of further refund and prefer to deal with the matter by seeking a consultation elsewhere. My advice would be for the practice to be a little more tolerant of NHS patients and to attenuate their interest in money considerably.
All I wanted was an NHS dental checkup and instead had a strange encounter. There are a number of questionable factors to it.
A subsequent consultation with a different dentist on the 3/8/23 indicated no problems.
21 de julio de 2023
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