Archive for the “Socialized Dentistry” Category
January sales or a queue for an NHS dentist?
Reforms to NHS dentistry are failing, the British Dental Association said yesterday as thousands of would-be patients besieged a practice near Portsmouth offering NHS care.
In scenes more typical of the January sales, patients arrived at first light at a new practice in Titchfield Common, Hampshire. Before the doors had opened, 2,000 people had registered online and over the phone. Hundreds more arrived in an attempt to grab the 1,000 remaining places. By the time the surgery opened at 10am, the queue stretched around the block.
Manori Ambrose, who set up the surgery, said: “There are a lot of people who need a dentist who are not even on the waiting list.â€
The British Dental Association (BDA) wrote to Barry Cockroft, the Chief Dental Officer of England, yesterday and called for changes to the dental contract, which has been in force for a year.
Flap wants to know why the British people are putting up with a government that fails to solve their problems?
The Labour government of Tony Blair’s solution: queues or self-treatment?
A better solution is easy – private dentistry with minimal government involvement.
The Brits have been humiliated by Iran, now by a government run (socialized) bureaucracy?
Hat Tip for this piece to NHS Blog Doctor who is fighting the UK NHS System first hand.
Dr. John Crippen’s piece on UK dentistry is here.
William Kelly, 43, extracted part of his own tooth, leaving a black stump. He plans to pull one more.
Previous:
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Dentistry for NHS Dentist Short Britain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Another Desperate Dentistry Story
NHS Dentistry Watch: NHS Dental Office Queues Banned
NHS Dentistry Watch: One in five dentists ready to leave NHS
Dentistry Today: Failed Asylum Seeker Poses as a Dentist
Dentistry Today: Many Dentists “Set to Quit NHSâ€
NHS Dentistry Watch: Poll Says Dentists Will Still Quit
NHS Dentistry Watch: More Dentists Now, More Dentists Later
NHS Dentistry Watch: Dentists Reject £295 million Scottish Executive Deal
Dentistry Today: NHS Dentistry Near Collapse?
NHS Dentistry Watch: Disaster Warning
National Health Service Watch: The Doctors Complain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Extraction
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Technorati Tags: dentistry, NHS, NHSdentistry, NationalHealthService, Britishdentistry, UKdentistry, dentist, dental
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William Kelly, 43, extracted part of his own tooth, leaving a black stump. He plans to pull one more.
New York Times: In a Dentist Shortage, British (Ouch) Do It Themselves
“I snapped it out myself,” said William Kelly, 43, describing his most recent dental procedure, the autoextraction of one of his upper teeth.
Now it is a jagged black stump, and the pain gnawing at Mr. Kelly’s mouth has transferred itself to a different tooth, mottled and rickety, on the other side of his mouth. “I’m in the middle of pulling that one out, too,” he said.
It is easy to be mean about British teeth. Mike Myers’s mouth is a joke in itself in the “Austin Powers” movies. In a “Simpsons” episode, dentalphobic children are shown “The Big Book of British Smiles,” cautionary photographs of hideously snaggletoothed Britons. In Mexico, protruding, discolored and generally unfortunate teeth are known as “dientes de ingles.”
But the problem is serious. Mr. Kelly’s predicament is not just a result of cigarettes and possibly indifferent oral hygiene; he is careful to brush once a day, he said. Instead, it is due in large part to the deficiencies in Britain’s state-financed dental service, which, stretched beyond its limit, no longer serves everyone and no longer even pretends to try.
Mr. Kelly, interviewed in a health clinic here as he waited for his son to see a doctor, last visited a dentist six years ago, in Sussex.
Since moving to Rochdale, a working-class suburb of Manchester, he has been unable to find a National Health Service dentist willing to take him on.
Every time he has tried to sign up, lining up with hundreds of others from the ranks of the desperate and the hurting — “I’ve seen people with bleeding gums where they’ve ripped their teeth out,” he said grimly — he has arrived too late and missed the cutoff.
“You could argue that Britain has not seen lines like this since World War II,” said Mark Pritchard, a member of Parliament who represents part of Shropshire, where the situation is just as grim. “Churchill once said that the British are great queuers, but I don’t think he meant that in connection to dental care.”
Britain has too few public dentists for too many people. At the beginning of the year, just 49 percent of the adults and 63 percent of the children in England and Wales were registered with public dentists.
Terrible treatment these British folks are receiving from their socialized government National Health Service. The government taxes the people exorbitantly, promises them basic dental care and then screws the patients and the dentists.
Is there any wonder why Tony Blair’s government sustained major losses in elections last week?
So, what is the solution?
Well, not the recruitment of Polish dentists to do work “that British dentists will NOT do.” Does this sound familiar?
The solution: privitization of British dentistry with government vouchers for the poor and indigent. And…. a little chairty form the British Dental Association until privitization kicks in fully.
Of course, there can always be more “Do It Yourself” stories.
George Glasper, 81, at the Dental Access Center in Rochdale. It gives emergency care but is always swamped.
Discuss this blog post and MORE…. at the FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blogs, My Dental Forum.
Previous:
NHS Dentistry Watch: Another Desperate Dentistry Story
NHS Dentistry Watch: NHS Dental Office Queues Banned
NHS Dentistry Watch: One in five dentists ready to leave NHS
Dentistry Today: Failed Asylum Seeker Poses as a Dentist
Dentistry Today: Many Dentists “Set to Quit NHSâ€
NHS Dentistry Watch: Poll Says Dentists Will Still Quit
NHS Dentistry Watch: More Dentists Now, More Dentists Later
NHS Dentistry Watch: Dentists Reject £295 million Scottish Executive Deal
Dentistry Today: NHS Dentistry Near Collapse?
NHS Dentistry Watch: Disaster Warning
National Health Service Watch: The Doctors Complain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Extraction
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Technorati Tags: dentistry, NHS, NHSdentistry, NationalHealthService, Britishdentistry, UKdentistry, dentist, dental
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The Daily Mail: Desperate dentistry: Woman pulls tooth with pliers
A woman told today how she got a friend to pull out one of her teeth with a pair of pliers and filmed the gruesome process on a mobile phone after failing to find an NHS dentist.
Diane Hunter, 45, described how she became so exasperated after two years of toothache she opted for a DIY option.
“In the end I just got really drunk and got a friend to pull it out with a pair of big pliers,” she told the Bradford Telegraph and Argus.
“There was a lots of blood but I just needed the tooth out – it was causing me great pain and it still is.”
Failed search for NHS care
Miss Hunter, who lives in the Listerhills area of Bradford, said she has not seen a dentist for more than 20 years and failed in her search for any offering NHS care.
She said she first tried the old schoolboy trick of tying one end of a piece of string around her tooth and the other around a door handle before slamming the door but it did not work.
Miss Hunter told the paper she would never pull her own teeth out again.
“I was going to do it again but I showed a nurse at the doctor’s surgery what I had done and she said it could cause a heart attack,” she said.
She even went to hospital for help at one point but was never given anything more than paracetamol.
Her friend performed the DIY dentistry about six months ago.
Another desperate dentistry story from the FAILED SOCIALIZED NHS DENTISTRY in the United Kingdom.
Private dentistry is best with government accomodations/subsidies/vouchers for the truely poor, infirm, old, or disabled.
Look at the comments section of this piece and the varying opinions:
What a silly woman, or is she just an exhibitionist? After experiencing the agony, literally, of a series of poor NHS dentists my wife and I ‘went private’. To our surprise it isn’t much more expensive but the treatment is far superior. Recently I required a prescription for antibiotics and that was actually cheaper than the NHS.
- Chris Downing, Rothwell, England
It’s funny that she could afford to get “really drunk” but wouldn’t consider putting her hand in her own pocket to go to a private dentist. Obviously she was looking for a free service and I guess in the end, that’s what she got.
- Linda B, Tunbridge Wells, Kent
Stupid woman. The money she spent getting drunk would have paid a significant amount towards the cost of a private dentist.
If she can’t be bothered to go to a dentist for regular check-ups why should she assume the NHS will sort out the mess.
- Anon, Reading
I don’t think we should have to go private. Haven’t we paid enough into the system all these years – where has all this money gone? (Or is that a silly question.)
- Diane, N Ireland
I dont blame her. I find myself and family in a similar situation. No NHS dentist available and unable to afford private care. What are we supposed to do?I wish I could get dental care for my childern even if not myself but none is forthcoming in the forseeable future.
- Kaz, cheshire
Stay tuned as more U.K. dentists go “PRIVATE.”
Previous:
NHS Dentistry Watch: NHS Dental Office Queues Banned
NHS Dentistry Watch: One in five dentists ready to leave NHS
Dentistry Today: Failed Asylum Seeker Poses as a Dentist
Dentistry Today: Many Dentists “Set to Quit NHSâ€
NHS Dentistry Watch: Poll Says Dentists Will Still Quit
NHS Dentistry Watch: More Dentists Now, More Dentists Later
NHS Dentistry Watch: Dentists Reject £295 million Scottish Executive Deal
Dentistry Today: NHS Dentistry Near Collapse?
NHS Dentistry Watch: Disaster Warning
National Health Service Watch: The Doctors Complain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Extraction
Related:
Technorati Tags: dentistry, NHS, NHSdentistry, NationalHealthService, Britishdentistry, UKdentistry, dentist, dental
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Mirror.co.uk: DENTIST QUEUES BANNED
QUEUES to sign up with new NHS dentists are to be banned by the Government.
Instead, people will have to make an appointment or register by phone to halt the long lines that have embarrassed Labour.
Dentistry minister Rosie Winterton told Primary Care Trusts it was “unacceptable” that people were forced to queue up for hours.
She added: “Of course, we want to consign the queues to history.”
So, rather than fix the abysmal National Health Service system and promote the privatization of British dentistry the Tony Blair Labour government decides it is better to “cover-up” the problem.
Labour has failed on Tony Blair’s 1999 promise that everyone in Britain would able to see a dentist for free within two years.
In some parts of the country, just one in five people have access to an NHS dentist.
Unpopular contracts being introduced by the Government are likely to make the problem worse.
The BBC reported that in parts of the country, NHS dentists who are converting to private practice in protest at the new contracts have been barred from continuing to treat children for free.
An “All or Nothing” mentality with the NHS will sink the entire NHS system.
Is this what British dentistry needs? A revolutionary private system?
You betcha…….
Previous:
NHS Dentistry Watch: One in five dentists ready to leave NHS
Dentistry Today: Failed Asylum Seeker Poses as a Dentist
Dentistry Today: Many Dentists “Set to Quit NHSâ€
NHS Dentistry Watch: Poll Says Dentists Will Still Quit
NHS Dentistry Watch: More Dentists Now, More Dentists Later
NHS Dentistry Watch: Dentists Reject £295 million Scottish Executive Deal
Dentistry Today: NHS Dentistry Near Collapse?
NHS Dentistry Watch: Disaster Warning
National Health Service Watch: The Doctors Complain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Extraction
Related:
Technorati Tags: dentistry, NHS, NHSdentistry, NationalHealthService, Britishdentistry, UKdentistry, dentist, dental
3 Comments »
News Telegraph: One in five dentists ready to leave NHS
Thousands of dentists are poised to leave the National Health Service in protest at the Government’s new work contract, prompting the worst crisis in the profession since NHS services began nearly 60 years ago.
According to research by the British Dental Association and the Conservative Party, as many as half of dentists in London and one in three in Birmingham plan to turn their backs on the NHS by refusing to sign the contract which takes effect on April 1. Nationally about 20 per cent are threatening to go.
The haemorrhage will leave about four million patients without access to a dentist. A further 40 per cent of the remaining 16,000 NHS dentists say they will reduce their health service work, leaving seven million more people struggling to obtain basic dental care.
The UK dentists are voting against the socialized NHS with their feet. Many millions of Britains will now have to scramble for dental care.
And the Tony Blair government does ?
Stay tuned…….
Previous:
Dentistry Today: Failed Asylum Seeker Poses as a Dentist
Dentistry Today: Many Dentists “Set to Quit NHSâ€
NHS Dentistry Watch: Poll Says Dentists Will Still Quit
NHS Dentistry Watch: More Dentists Now, More Dentists Later
NHS Dentistry Watch: Dentists Reject £295 million Scottish Executive Deal
Dentistry Today: NHS Dentistry Near Collapse?
NHS Dentistry Watch: Disaster Warning
National Health Service Watch: The Doctors Complain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Extraction
Related:
Technorati Tags: dentistry, dentist, dental, NHS, NationalHealthService, teeth, tooth, bogusdentist, UnitedKingdom
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BBC News: Dentist let partner drill teeth
A dentist from south-east London who let her unqualified boyfriend treat patients has been struck off.
Mogjan Azari allowed her lover Omid Amidi-Mazaheri to work on more than 600 patients, leaving many in agony.
He drilled out cavities without local anaesthetic and installed expensive fillings that crumbled within days.
The pair charged the NHS for the bungled work and other non-existent procedures and are believed to have made £120,000 from the scam.
Dentistry in the United Kingdom has certainly had its problems this past year. The National Health Service has failed and dentists are running from being participants, the British Labour government of Tony Blair is importing dentists from Poland and other countries to treat patients in the socialized NHS, and British citizens are waiting in long lines for dental care (to register for an NHS dentist) or failing to find a dentist to treat them for a basic emergency.
Now, this scandal.
The Scotsman: Patients warned of HIV risk from bogus dentist
HUNDREDS of former patients of a failed asylum seeker who posed as a dentist to con tens of thousands of pounds out of the NHS are being contacted by health officials amid fears that they may have contracted HIV.
More than 600 people treated by Omid Amidi-Mazaheri, who posed as a specialist performing complex dental operations without qualifications, have been sent letters urging them to get blood tests to confirm whether his practice has spread HIV or hepatitis B and C.
Jay Leno on last night’s Tonight Show even had a joke about British dentists, asking “Do they have them?”
Amidi-Mazaheri, 41, an Iranian national, was jailed for two years in March this year at Southwark Crown Court for defrauding the NHS out of at least £120,000.
The former lab technician arrived in the UK in 1998 and began working in a south London dental surgery in 2002.
Medical experts stressed to Amidi-Mazaheri’s former patients that there was only a “small” risk of infection, but they warned that because he might not have followed infection control procedures, it could not be ruled out. Croydon, Lambeth and Southwark primary care trusts in south London have employed a team of NHS dentists, counsellors and nurses to carry out the tests and perform any reparatory dental work needed.
During his two-year charade, Amidi-Mazaheri carried out dental work at practices in Norbury, Tulse Hill and East Dulwich in south London. His catalogue of lies and deceit was finally uncovered following a joint operation between NHS fraud investigators and detectives from Scotland Yard’s Economic Crime Unit.
Amidi-Mazaheri used syringes, probes and drills to treat patients even though he was not trained or qualified. Patients giving evidence during his trial told how his fillings would crumble within days and how he would clumsily drop surgical instruments down their throats while they were being treated.
The police investigation initially centred on Mogjan Azari, 38, a fully-trained Swedish dentist who ran a string of dental practices in south London. It was Azari who first employed Amidi-Mazaheri and he began treating patients in April 2002. Within weeks he was filling cavities and carrying out complex root canal work. The proceeds of his fraudulent work were split 50-50, allowing Azari to inflate her earnings to £500,000 a year.
In April 2003, Amidi-Mazaheri poached one of Azari’s dentists, Johannes Kidane, and set about acquiring his own practice in south London, where he once more worked on unsuspecting patients.
However, detectives had launched Operation Immanuel, suspecting Azari of making bogus claims for NHS funds from her practices.
Azari, 38, a mother of one, wept as she was jailed for a year in March. Amidi-Mazaheri was sentenced to 12 months in prison for two counts of obtaining money by deception while working with Azari and a further year for three counts of obtaining money by deception while working at Mr Kidane’s former practice.
And the poor patients?
The British Dental Association working with the government should step in to assure the public that licensing and dental practice is up to international standards.
The British government should work with dentistry to set standards, licensing and financing schemes that will ease the transition of a socialized dental system to a private one.
Previous:
Dentistry Today: Many Dentists “Set to Quit NHSâ€
NHS Dentistry Watch: Poll Says Dentists Will Still Quit
NHS Dentistry Watch: More Dentists Now, More Dentists Later
NHS Dentistry Watch: Dentists Reject £295 million Scottish Executive Deal
Dentistry Today: NHS Dentistry Near Collapse?
NHS Dentistry Watch: Disaster Warning
National Health Service Watch: The Doctors Complain
NHS Dentistry Watch: Do It Yourself Extraction
Related:
Technorati Tags: dentistry, dentist, dental, NHS, NationalHealthService, teeth, tooth, bogusdentist, UnitedKingdom
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 The reception at the new City Dental in Stockholm 24 November 2005. The clinic, staffed by Polish dentists, opened earlier this month and sees a continious streem od Swedes who are searching for a cheaper alternative to the expensive Swedish clinics. The Polish dentists will leave after six months to avoid paying taxes and will be replaced by new.
AFP has Polish dentists and Thai doctors a toothache for Swedish model.
Sweden’s oft-criticized healthcare system has become the arena for competition from low-cost countries which are offering high-quality services at cut prices, challenging the Scandinavian country’s famous social model. Foreign health professionals are giving Swedes frustrated with long queues and worsening service in public healthcare the cheap private-sector alternative many have been looking for.
Like “the Polish plumber”, who in France has come to symbolize the challenges of low-cost services from new EU members, Swedes are grappling with the phenomenon of Polish dentists and Thai doctors, who are offering services at half the cost of their Swedish competitors.
While Stockholmers with toothaches are flocking to “City Dental”, which opened earlier this month in the heart of the capital and is staffed entirely by Polish dentists, not everyone is happy.
Read it all.
Hard to keep capitalism down…….
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