A dental practice in the Camden area

3. Ms I complains about the care and treatment provided to her by the Practice between March and November 2023. She complains;

• in June 2023, she was fitted with an unsuitable metal crown instead of a porcelain crown as she had requested • despite complaining of increasing pain following the crown fitting, no X-rays were taken • referrals to the dental hospital between 2023 and 2024 were rejected due to errors by the practice in providing the correct information.

4. Ms I says in November 2023, an infection was confirmed by a different dentist for which she needed antibiotics and referral for further treatment. Rejected referrals meant Ms I was left without further care and still in pain.

5. As a result of bringing the complaint to us, Mrs I is seeking an apology, service improvements and level 3 financial remedy.

6. Ms I went to the Practice in March 2023 with a cracked tooth on the upper left side that required a porcelain crown (due to metal sensitivity).

7. The crown was fitted in June 2023 but she was given a metal crown covered with porcelain instead. Shortly after the crown was fitted part of it chipped away so she returned to the Practice in August 2023 hoping for an X-ray to assess the damage but was not given one.

8. By November 2023, Ms I was experiencing significant pain that had spread to her jaw, so she went to a different dentist for treatment. The dentist took an X-ray and found the tooth was cracked and infected.

9. Following this, Ms I was referred to the dental hospital for further treatment and says there were then approximately 6 rejected referrals, the latest being submitted in July 2024, she says they were all rejected due to containing incorrect information.

10. Ms I complained to the Practice on 14 March 2025. The Practice sent its final response on 12 May 2025 and Ms I brought the complaint to us on 18 December 2025.

12. The law says a person needs to make their complaint to us within a year of becoming aware of the problem. We cannot investigate complaints brought to us after one year, unless we consider there is a good reason to do so. We have discussed this with Ms I to understand the reasons they could not do so. We have also considered the time the Practice took to respond to Ms I’s complaint.

13. In relation to the crown and X-ray issues, Ms I says she became aware she had reason to complain in October 2023, when she started to suffer with symptoms of her tooth infection.

14. To be within our time limit, Ms I needed to have complained to us within a year of the event happening. She complained to us in December 2025, 26 months after the event complained about. Therefore, her concerns about the crown fitting and lack of X-ray are out of time by 14 months.

15. Ms I complained to the Practice about the rejected referrals 8 months after the last referral in July 2024, and brought her complaint to us 9 months after this. Sso this part of the complaint is out of time by 5 months.

16. Ms I complained to the Practice on 14 March 2025, the Practice sent an initial response on 19 March 2025 and Ms [name redacted] wrote back to challenge this on 28 April 2025. The Practice sent its final response on 12 May 2025. Therefore, local resolution took 2 months in total.

17. We asked Ms I why she waited until March 2025 to complain to the Practice and what was happening during that time that stopped her from being able to complain. Ms I explained she was informally pursuing this with the Practice during this time verbally and hoping to get the matter resolved without having to make a formal complaint. She says the referral process was taking a lot of time, and she was in constant contact with the Practice.

18. We asked what if anything changed and prompted her to complain in March 2025 when she did. She says she realised it was never going to get resolved, she was still in agony, and it was impacting her emotionally and physically. It got to the point she had to go to A&E to seek emergency care and it felt like it had become very serious and warranted a formal complaint.

19. Ms I contributed to the delay further by leaving a 7 month gap between receiving the final response from the Practice in May 2025 and bringing the complaint to us in December 2025.

20. We asked Ms I the reason for this 7 month delay. Ms I explained this was down to the demands of life and family as she has a caring role for her elderly 90 year old parents who do not live locally so it involves a lot of travel and so her time during this period was focussed on them. She says they live abroad and each parent would come over here one at a time for visits to see family and for appointments which she would take them to.

21. We asked what, if anything changed in her circumstances which meant she was able to bring the complaint to us when she did. She said nothing has changed and she is still caring for her elderly parents in the same way at the moment.

22. We appreciate Mrs I’s caring responsibilities have taken up some of her time, but we consider Ms I could have brought the complaint to us sooner as there was a 7 month delay following the Practice’s response. She says her caring role has not changed since and is still the same now.

23. We have seen no strong reason to set aside our time limit on this complaint. Having carefully considered Ms I’s explanations for not complaining to us sooner, we do not consider there are sufficient grounds to exercise discretion here. For this reason, we will be taking no further action.

24. While we are unable to take further action, we do not wish to diminish Ms I’s experience and recognise this has been a difficult and distressing time. We thank Ms I for bringing this complaint to us and wish her well for the future.

1. We have carefully considered Ms I’s complaint about the Practice. We were sorry to hear about the circumstances of the complaint, and the impact she has endured.

2. Unfortunately, Ms I’s complaint falls outside of our 12-month time limit. We have carefully considered all the circumstances of the complaint and have listened to the reasons for delays Ms I told us about. However, we have not seen good reason to set aside our time limit to one side. As such, we will not consider her complaint further.