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TV's Dispatches investigates unethical dentists
20th May 2011
A new TV documentary being screened on Monday (23 May) promises to lift the lid on the unethical practices of some of the UK's dentists.
As the government's cuts to the NHS start to bite, Sam Lister, The Times' health editor, investigates dentistry, going undercover to reveal how some dentists are misleading patients about their rights to NHS treatment.
The programme claims it will expose dentists who are waiting until patients are 'lying back in the chair' before telling them they must pay hundreds of pounds for private treatment, which should be available on the NHS.
Dispatches also reveals that children's teeth are being neglected under the NHS and that cost-cutting dentists are outsourcing lab work to countries like China where there are little or no checks on safety or quality.
During the three-month investigation, the programme claims it uncovered evidence of a system that often prevents the patient from getting the right treatment at the right price.
Channel 4 claims how the programme found some NHS patients were often none the wiser when asked to pay two or three times the amount they should.
The PR says: 'We sent reporters undercover to identify common ways in which dentists "game" the system, while professionals themselves also blow the whistle on concerns about how NHS dentistry has become less about the promotion of oral health and more about the pressures of time, money and an unworkable Government contract.
'Reforms brought in five years ago were meant to improve dental health and access to dentistry. They were meant to make life more straightforward for dentists and patients, turning a fee-per-item system into one with three bands of treatment, and three rates for the patient to pay.
'But while the changes have increased the number of people seeing an NHS dentist, in many instances they have had damaging repercussions. Some dentists have found themselves unable to give up the time for the procedures their patients need, and out of pocket if they try.'
It adds: 'For some, it is now simply a question of working a flawed system as best they can, but as experts and insiders show, the fundamentals of good NHS care and full disclosure are being badly compromised. Our reporter needed a root canal treatment for an infected molar tooth, one of the most common procedures on the NHS.
'Despite checking in as an NHS patient, he was encouraged to go privately wherever he went - with dentists waiting until he was in the operating chair before advising that the only option for safe and successful care was to pay far more than the NHS rate.
'Others warned that going on the NHS would be impossible unless a patient was referred to hospital, or if they went for the extreme fix of having the tooth extracted. None were clear about the prices that our patient should have been paying.
The investigate TV documentary also visits dental laboratory workers who reported how the care of patients is now being compromised by cost cutting.
Unregistered laboratory work imported from abroad, for a fraction of the market price, is becoming ever more attractive.
But, as the programme shows, the safety of such products is, at best, unknown.
The Truth about Your Dentist is on Dispatches on Channel 4 at 8.00pm on Monday.
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