A dental practice in the Shropshire area

4. Mrs O complains the Practice failed to complete a root canal correctly on 5 May 2021.

5. Mrs O says she has been traumatised by the whole procedure and cannot eat properly. She says she had an infection, needed further surgery to complete the root canal and on 24 June 2021 had the tooth removed because the Practice had fractured it. She says she also had to stop breastfeeding her baby, as the infection needed antibiotics she could not take while breastfeeding.

6. Mrs O wants compensation and for the Practice to replace the tooth without charge.

7. Mrs O visited the Practice on 18 March 2021 for a routine check-up and was told she needed a filling. She had the filling done on 22 April. During this appointment she was told she may need a root canal.

8. Mrs O had root canal work done at the Practice on 5 May. On 9 May she got toothache. She went to hospital and was given antibiotics to treat an abscess. The hospital told her she could not continue to breastfeed her baby while taking the antibiotics.

9. On 10 May she went back to the Practice to have the root canal completed. She was told the tooth was fractured and may need to be removed.

10. Mrs O’s husband complained to the Practice on 19 May. The Practice acknowledged the complaint on 20 May and responded on 28 May.

11. On 24 June the Practice told Mrs O the fracture was too deep, and it removed the tooth.

12. Mrs O brought her complaint to us on 15 June 2022.

15. The law says we can only consider complaints brought to us within one year of the person becoming aware of a reason to complain. We can consider putting the time limit to one side, but only for a good reason.

16. Mrs O told us she had reason to complain on 9 May 2021, so to meet our time limit she needed to bring us her complaint by 9 May 2022. But she did not do this until 15 June 2022. This means her complaint is outside our time limit by five weeks.

17. We then considered Mrs O’s reasons for this delay as well as the time the Practice took to respond to the complaint.

18. Mrs O’S husband raised a complaint on her behalf on 19 May 2021, just after she became aware of the problem. The Practice acknowledged this complaint the next day and gave her a copy of its complaint process. It responded to Mrs O on 28 May and directed her to us if she was unhappy with its response. So we are satisfied Mrs O knew about us in May 2021 and aware this was how she should pursue her complaint.

19. When we spoke to Mrs O we asked why it took her from getting the Practice’s response on 28 May 2021 until 15 June 2022 to bring her complaint to us. She explained in June 2021 the Dental Defence Union approached her and said it would look into her complaint on behalf of the dentist who treated her. Mrs O told us she thought this was the right route to take at the time.

20. Mrs O said the Dental Defence Union took a lot of time to investigate her complaint and delivered a final response in April 2022. She said between June 2021 and April 2022 she was actively chasing it and was unhappy with its part in the process. While we can understand Mrs O’s decision to try to resolve her concerns with the Dental Defence Union this did mean her complaint to us is outside our time limit, which is set in law. Mrs O made the decision to wait for the Dental Defence Union before coming to us. She was unhappy with the time it was taking and a lack of engagement, but although she knew about us she still decided to carry on this approach.

21. Mrs O did not give a reason why she did not bring her complaint to us until 15 June 2022 when she got the Dental Defence Union response in April 2022.

22. We can understand the experience was traumatic for Mrs O and we appreciate she thought she was doing the right thing engaging with the Dental Defence Union. But she could have contacted us at the same time or once she knew it was taking a while to get a response. She could have got more information to help her decide what to do. This may have meant she brought her complaint to us within our time limit.

23. We have considered Mrs O’s reasons for not coming to us earlier and the time it took to investigate her complaint locally. But we have not seen enough of a reason to set our time limit aside in this case.

24. It is difficult to justify putting the time limit to one side based on the reasons we have been given, as there were opportunities for her to bring the complaint to us sooner. Her complaint is outside our time limit and we cannot set it aside for this complaint.

25. We understand Mrs O’s experience caused her great distress. But it is important we consider and act within the law. We regret any further upset this decision may cause. We hope this statement clearly explains the reasons why will not be considering the complaint further.

1. The Parliamentary Health and Service Ombudsman has carefully considered Mrs O’s complaint about a dental practice in the Shropshire area (the Practice). We were so sorry to hear about Mrs O’s experience and recognise the difficult and distressing time she has faced.

2. Based on the evidence we have seen Mrs O’s complaint falls outside our 12-month time limit. We have considered the reasons Mrs O gave for any delays in bringing her complaint to us. Unfortunately, we have not seen strong enough reasons for us to put our time limit to one side.

3. We are sorry for any further distress this may cause and hope our explanations below clarify how we have fully considered this.