Skip to main content

Patient Charter

Our Responsibilities

Keeping Our Patients Safe

Our practice aims to provide consistent quality dental care for all our patients. We have implemented a clinical governance policy to assist us in our individual responsibility of maintaining the highest level of care.

Patient Charter

Our Responsibilities
  • To listen to your dental problems and to give you an explanation of treatment and solution to your problem that you can understand.
  • To give you a clear and written estimate of your treatment.
  • To respect your dignity and the choices you make.
  • To protect the confidentiality of any information you provide.
  • To co-operate with other members of our dental team and other health care colleagues so as to act in your best interest.
  • To follow the latest cross-infection guidelines ensuring your safety is of prime concern.
  • To keep up to date with the latest technologies and treatments available.
  • To do all we can to keep to appointment times as we understand your time is precious.
Your responsibilities
  • To respect our appointment times and let us know as soon as possible if you cannot make an appointment in order that it may be given to someone else.
  • To pay for treatment at the end of each visit as requested.
  • To follow any advice we may give you after treatment.
  • To respect our dental team and reception staff as we respect you as a patient.
Cancelling Appointments

If you need to cancel an appointment please inform the surgery as soon as possible giving at least 24hrs notice where possible. If the surgery is closed please leave a message on the answering machine so that we can allocate that appointment to someone else.

f you fail to do so without good reason you will be notified verbally or written that if it happens again then it is at the surgery’s discretion if we are able to provide further treatment.

If a second appointment is cancelled at short notice without good reason, then at the surgery’s discretion you will be notified verbally/written that we are unable to provide any further treatment.

Cancelling Hygiene Appointments

If you need to re-arrange or cancel a hygiene appointment you must give us at least 48 working hours ‘notice.

The hygienists are booked for weeks/ months in advance and failure to give adequate notice causes delay to other patients that could have been seen sooner. Due to the high amount of missed and late cancelled hygiene appointments we have had no choice but to introduce a missed hygiene charge.

If you miss or fail to give 48hrs notice when cancelling or rearranging the full hygiene cost will still be payable. New patients who wish to see the hygienist for the first time and patients that have missed appointments in the past will be asked to pay upfront for hygiene treatments.

Missed Appointments/ Appointments Not Kept

If an appointment is missed you will be notified that you failed to attend an appointment and if you could contact the surgery to rebook another appointment. If there is a valid reason then contact the surgery at your earliest convenience (within 24 hours if possible) notifying us of the reason and to re-arrange another appointment.

If you fail to attend 2 or more appointments without good reason then at the surgery’s discretion you will be notified verbally or written that we are unable to provide any further treatment.

To avoid any disappointment please ensure that you give sufficient notice if you are able to attend an appointment. If you miss an appointment and there is a valid reason contact the surgery as soon as possible to inform us of the reason and to re-arrange another appointment if possible.

Complaints Procedure

In this practice we take complaints very seriously and try to ensure that all our patients are pleased with their experience of our service. When patients complain, they are dealt with courteously and promptly so that the matter is resolved as quickly as possible.

Our aim is to react to complaints in the way in which we would want our complaint about a service to be handled. We learn from every mistake that we make and we respond to patients’ concerns in a caring and sensitive way.

The person responsible for dealing with any complaint about the service that we provide is Sunita Mehta the Practice Manager.

Violent or Abusive Behaviour

Any violent or abusive behaviour will result in immediate withdrawal from practice

Make an Appointment

Your Opinion

Here at Abbey Dental, we are always striving to improve our service to you and so we are constantly seeking your opinions and suggestions.

In order to improve the services we offer and give you the dental care that you deserve, we have feedback questionnaires at our practice. We always welcome your input, it's only with this that you can help us to get better.

Get in touch with us for more details on our services NHS dentistry.