Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
15,000 facing dental crisis as practice quits NHS contract
Two city practices now to care for 15,000 extra patients
There are fears of a fresh crisis in our healthcare after the city’s largest dental practice pulled the plug on its NHS contract.
It means thousands of people across the district could find themselves without access to an affordable dentist.
Bradley and Partners, in St Peter’s Lane, says after 70 years it will no longer offer the subsidised service because of the escalating cost and bureaucracy.
Its owner Dr Nadim Safdar says 15,000 patients will need to find a new NHS dentist and says the only two other NHS practices in Canterbury do not have the capacity to take such numbers on.
He says ending the contract on February 1 was the hardest decision of his career but forced on the business by “unrealistic” targets imposed by the NHS.
He insists the decision has nothing to do with a long-running and ongoing NHS England fraud investigation into him in which he vehemently denies any wrongdoing.
Dr Safdar brands the NHS as “unrecognisable” from the institution the practice signed up to in 1948 – the year after opening – and his reluctant decision to withdraw from the contract is a symptom of the “crisis” dentistry is suffering.
“The time and attention that we want to spend on our patients is taken up by NHS bureaucracy forcing us to pursue unrealistic targets which are excessively punitive if not met,” he said.
“We are committed to offering the best possible care and do not want to provide a second rate service to our NHS patients.
“Two dentists who did do NHS work have recently retired and it is increasingly difficult to find new dentists who will do that work.
“Also for the last few years we have not been able to cover the cost of providing NHS dentistry from what it pays us. As a result we have been privately subsidising the care. Regrettably, such a subsidy is no longer tenable.”
Dr Safdar bought the practice in 2014 and has eight dentists on his team.
He admits the elderly and children could be the worst affected by the decision.
“Many of our patients have told us that they are unable to access local services or that they simply cannot afford NHS care. We understand their desperation and feel compelled to do whatever we can,” he said.
As a consequence, he says the practice will be offering a walk-in emergency ‘dental hardship clinic’ for those in discomfort who cannot afford to go private.
“The clinic will be paid for by me in conjunction with my associate dentists, who will offer their services to the hardship clinic for free,” he said.
“My colleagues and I unanimously agreed that although we were unable to remain within the NHS, setting up the hardship clinic was the right thing to do.
“It is the first of its kind and is designed to deal with urgent dental problems. Everybody is eligible and no one’s paperwork will be checked. If anyone is in desperate dental need, it is very obvious.”