Mr C who had complained to the Dental Practice about the poor fitting dentures that he had paid for, was unhappy that in a telephone conversation the Dental Practice had informed him that he had been “struck off their register” due to a breakdown of trust. Mr C, who had been refunded the cost of his treatment, said that he was now having to find a new NHS Dentist. He wanted an apology for the way he had been treated.
The Ombudsman found no evidence that the decision itself to remove Mr C from the Dental Practice’s register was improperly taken. However, the Dental Practice accepted that there was a shortcoming in its complaint handling process and how it how it had applied its removal policy (“the Policy”) in Mr C’s case. In particular, it had not written to him setting out the reasons for its decision to remove him from its dental list. In reviewing the Policy, the Ombudsman concluded that there was a degree of ambiguity about the circumstances when a letter would be written to a patient.
The Dental Practice agreed as part of a settlement that it would apologise to Mr C for the shortcomings identified in the way that it followed the Policy. In addition, it would amend the Policy so that it was clear that a letter would be sent in all cases about a patient’s removal and relevant information provided in relation to NHS patients.
