Question about going to the dentist

[gerry]

Not that i'm needing to go as i have been very lucky, but i haven't been to the dentist now for a number of years & was recently told by a friend of mine that if you haven't been to your dentist for a while the dentist can take you off his list as a patient.Is this true?i've always thought the dentist just keeps hold of your file & you are always a patient of his/hers.

[kags]

Your friend is right, if you are an NHS patient the dentist can remove you from his list if you don't attend for 12 months. However, the dentist will normally write to you before he removes you from his list, to warn you - can you remember getting a letter? Check with him/her - you may find he no longer accepts new NHS patients and you will have to find one who does - in some places this is not easy. Many dentists don't treat any adult NHS patients any more, and they want you to take out insurance policies so they will treat (and charge) you as a private patient. My advice would be to find a dentist now, even if you don't need one, because if you develop a rampant toothache you don't want to be stranded!

[kags]

That last post should say "some dentists" rather than "many" - there are still plenty who do treat NHS patients.

[Miss Zippy]

Yes, as Kags said most dentists will remove you as an NHS patient if you haven't attended for NHS treatment within a certain period of time. This happened to me recently. My dental practice's policy was to strike you off as an NHS patient after 15 months of non-attendance. Although I had attended during the past 15 months, it was for private treatement, not NHS, so was not counted (which I didn't realise). Dentists are not obliged to write and tell you you are in danger of being struck off (mine didn't, hence I was caught out). My dentist (in common with all others in my area) aren't taking on any NHS patients at the moment, but is happy to accept me as a private patient (now having to pay �45 for a check up, compared to about �7 on the NHS!).

[saffstar]

Just to defend dentists (and I'm not one) - Dentists do not 'strike you off' after 15 months, your registration expires. What happens is this: Your dentist receives a (very, very small) payment each year from the NHS for having you as a registered patient. For this reason, the NHS system will currently only allow a patient to be registered for 15 months after they have last seen their dentist (so a dentist doesn't keep getting paid for providing care for patients that they haven't seen for years and years. I believe that it did used to be the case that your registration with a dentist was indefinite. The current registration period was cut from 18 months about 3 years ago, there was some advertising of this in national press but it obviously wasn't successful because most people don't find out about their registration having expired until they've got toothache and can't get an appointment.