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The NHS Choices website is the only site that provides patients with information on which NHS dentists are currently accepting new NHS patients.

In March 2017 the NHS Choices website was updated following a large number of complaints raised by Healthwatch, Which? and the Advertising Standards Association (ASA) around lack of information.

However instead of the March 2017 changes providing improvements in the quality of information available to patients Healthwatch Kirklees feel that we are now seeing an increase in dentists failing to supply any data at all on the website.

If there is one issue that defines Healthwatch in Kirklees, it is access to NHS Dentistry. It was the first thing that people said to us when we started in 2013, and people ring us every single week looking for NHS dentists in Kirklees.

Over the past two years we have heard stories from patients about penalty charges from the NHS Business Services Authority.

Penalty notices are sent to patients who have incorrectly claimed free dental or prescription charges. The charges include the cost of the treatment and also a penalty fine of up to £100.00.

Access to dentistry in Kirklees has been a massive issue for Healthwatch in the last 5 years with 60% of people we asked in 2016 not having an NHS Dentist. One comment we heard in a bus station in Dewsbury said “I go to the dentist every 6 months. I never have any work done, just a checkup.” We wondered why people in pain could not find a dentist, whilst others has check-ups for healthy teeth.