Dental patient wins £19,000 for substandard dental treatment

Our client, an 81 year old man from the East Midlands, was awarded £19,000 in an out of court settlement after two dentists’ poor treatment resulted in numerous lost teeth and extensive corrective work.Mr L attended dentists, Dr A and Dr B, at his local practice between 1985 and 2009 for routine dental treatment including fillings, crowns and root treatments.In October 2009, Mr L began to question the care he was receiving so attended a different dentist. The new dentist took clinical photographs which revealed that 2 of Mr L’s upper teeth and 2 of his lower teeth were decayed and there was also evidence of tooth decay beneath a crown in his upper jaw. Mr L was referred to a specialist for an implant consultation and it was under his care that it was discovered that Mr L was suffering from decay on several of his other teeth and had several substandard root fillings.It was as a result of Dr A’s poor root canal treatments at 3 teeth and Dr A’s and Dr B’s failure to treat tooth decay at 5 teeth, that Mr L had experienced pain and infection over many years. He had lost 5 teeth and faces the loss of 2 more in the future. He also had to undergo the discomfort of implant placement at 4 teeth and root canal treatment to bring his teeth to health.Neither dentist admitted liability for their failings but Mr L was successful in bringing a claim against them with the Dental Law Partnership. Mr L said, “At first I had no reason to doubt the expertise of my dentists, but I am glad I was able to get justice for the faulty dental work”.

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