Can't find an NHS dentist

Hi everyone,
So I have some problems with my teeth, with some gum bleeding and tartar building up fast and I know I should visit a dentist but the problem is, I simply cannot find one.

I called one dentist, they said they are not accepting new patients, I am like ok so I call another, they also say they are not accepting, ok I try another one, they also say they are not accepting so clearly is bad luck I am thinking, the more practises I called the more I started to realise this whole thing was a joke.

I understand one, two or even 4 practices not accepting new patients but ten?? I called up ten practices, TEN GOD DAMN dentists (Some pretty far away from my home) and not a single one of them is accepting new patients. Like honestly just how bad things can be? Before the pandemic it was not this hard to get hold of a dentist so why are things so damn difficult right now?

I could go private but you know the obvious reason why I am hesitant, just what am I meant to do if I can't find an NHS dentist but need one?

Problems finding an NHS dentist

If after contacting several dental surgeries you still cannot find a dentist accepting NHS patients, call NHS England's Customer Contact Centre on 0300 311 2233.

NHS England commissions dental services in England and is required to meet the needs of their local population for both urgent and routine dental care.

Doubt that will help. The problem isn’t that dentists are refusing NHS patients because they simply don’t want to see them, the problem is dentists can’t see NHS patients because the system is not fit for purpose. There have been problems for years, but the pandemic has been the tip of the iceberg.

The NHS link this comes from says that the NHS are required to find someone NHS dental treatment if they are having difficulty finding it themselves. Are you saying that you have evidence that having phoned the NHS number specified that they fail to comply with that ?

If there is physically no capacity for new/existing NHS patients to be seen, you cannot suddenly magic up that capacity. Sure, the number you’ve provided will try to find someone who can take them on, but that might be somewhere far away (since OP has already searched farther than their immediate locality) and therefore inconvenient, or they’ll be placed on a waiting list as so many other people have. By all means try, obviously.

I wasn't disagreeing with anything you are saying about the service provision and the current situation is poor ..... just saying that there's a phone number help line for people in the OP's situation. My inclination would be to try it, rather than just assume it doesn't work.

The capacity issue applies to lots of things, such as getting a GP appointment, dialling 999 for an ambulance etc. If you don't try then you don't know the outcome.

And I also don’t disagree that the OP shouldn’t try - just that it’s unlikely to achieve much due to the way the NHS dentistry system works - which is actually a lot different to dialling 999 or asking for a GP appointment.

It actually seems more serious to me that somebody dies waiting 40 hours for an ambulance to arrive, or waits outside A&E in an ambulance for 10 hours, or has to wait 3-4 weeks for a GP appointment. There are a lot of different aspects of the health service not working as they should.

Yes I agree, although not sure how this is relevant to what I said.

Fairly obvious I would say, but I don't have time to explain it for you.

It wasn't obvious.

I wasn't aware we had started a poll on it, but it's nice to see that forum helpers stick together, rep together etc.

I suggest it would help the OP more to stick to helpful contributions like the link I originally posted. I'm not even sure why it was commented on in the first place.

Doubt that will help. The problem isn’t that dentists are refusing NHS patients because they simply don’t want to see them, the problem is dentists can’t see NHS patients because the system is not fit for purpose. There have been problems for years, but the pandemic has been the tip of the iceberg.