The patient in this case attended her dentist (Dentist 1) to get root canal treatment on four teeth and a crown fitted on one. In all she paid €2,600 in fees and believed her treatment to be complete. The crown became loose. On a trip to a town where she had lived previously she went to her old dentist (Dentist 2) and asked for his opinion.

Dentist2 said that the crown that was fitted was only a temporary one and that there were questions over the root canal treatment.

The patient claimed she went back to Dentist 1 and asked him if the crown was a permanent one and he said that it was. The patient relayed her concerns to the practice’s receptionist. She then received a call from Dentist 1 and he sent her a cheque for €900 as she was told she got, and was charged for, a permanent crown but only received a temporary one.

Dentist 1 recommended doing further root canal treatment and crowning. The patient began seeing Dentist 2 again and he didn’t agree that more root treatment and crowning would be the way forward. He said the teeth were very broken down and that extraction and implants would provide a much more successful and predictable outcome.

The patient went ahead and had more dental treatment performed by Dentist 2 and she believed the work that was done previously made this work necessary. She said she had problems with all four root treatments performed by Dentist 1. Three of these teeth had to be extracted and implants fitted. The patient had to go to an endodontist to get root canal treatment done on the other tooth.

Dentist 1 didn’t agree that his work was responsible for the patient needing to get further work done. Three of the teeth had originally needed root canal treatment and another needed root canal treatment and a crown. After the DCRS organised for Dentist 1 to view the patient’s x-rays and receive confirmation that three of the four teeth he treated had to be extracted and the other re-treated, he offered to refund the money. The patient received a refund of €1,400, on top of the €900 she had already received.

This case took a lot of work from the DCRS, with documents having to be sourced and 128 emails being exchanged during the case.