Comfort Dental Springfield complaints

Company states: Mr. Wilson was first seen in our office on 1/20/22. We took a full mouth series of xrays and performed a comprehensive exam. This patient had rampant decay across the front of his teeth as the xrays clearly show. Our treatment plan consisted of doing 4 root canals on the front 4 teeth in an effort to save the teeth due to the patient's age, and his and his mother's choice. An alternative treatment plan would have consisted of removing his front 4 teeth due to extent and size of cavities that the patient presented with. The patient scheduled a visit on 3/2/22 where 4 root canals were done on his front four teeth and a very large filling was placed on his upper right canine tooth. After removing all of the decay there was barely any natural tooth structure left, which necessitated placing a post on all 4 front teeth to help retain the fillings. We did the posts at no charge to the patient as insurance didn't cover the posts. Posts are necessary when the extent of decay is so large that there isn't enough natural tooth structure to retain a restoration. These four teeth were treatment planned for crowns as a final restoration which was approved by the insurance company. We have supporting xrays showing the successful completion of the work. In addition, a consent form was signed by this patient prior to starting the root canal treatment, which she claims she didn't sign. We will provide you a copy of the consent form. We spent a lot of time and effort to help this patient get his smile back and everything was thoroughly explained in the consent form and verbally to both the patient and the patient's mother who signed the consent form. the patient then returned for a visit on 4/28/22 and we did several large fillings on the lower right. Again, the patient presented with very large preexisting decay on all of his teeth. The patient returned on 5/5/2022 with some pain on the lower right, we adjusted the patient's bite, because sometimes deeper fillings can be sensitive and if the filling is a bit high it can increase sensitivity and pain. The patient reported relief after the adjustment. The patient scheduled to come back for some more fillings on 9/20/2022 and he wanted to do the left side of his mouth. We administered local anesthetic on the left side, which is when the patient's mom came in and started to become very rude, disrespectful, and belligerent stating that the patient wanted to have the upper right done. We complied with their request and were ready to administer anesthetic on the upper right and were ready and willing to perform this treatment. The patient then said he didn't want to be numb, and the patient and patient's mom became very rude and disrespectful at which made us feel uncomfortable and at which point we felt the need to dismiss them from the office and our practice, and to seek further treatment elsewhere. The patient called the doctor a "b*tch" and the mom said that he came out with not teeth in the front and that she wasn't aware that the front teeth would look like that, and that we caused his teeth to become like this. Again, this was clearly explained to the patient and mother via consent form and verbally prior to doing any treatment. We spent an extensive amount of time helping this patient, as we do with all our patients. His oral hygiene is very poor, he had extensive dental needs and we provided good quality service to him. We have very clear documentation, consent forms and radiographs that support the treatment that was administered. We are more than willing to have another dentist conduct a peer review on this case also. One thing that we will not tolerate is profanity and disrespect when we take so much time, diligence, and pride in the dental treatment we provide. In the complaint, the patient's mother claims that we were doing extractions, however we have not performed any extractions. With the size and condition of the decay in this patient's mouth along with his poor oral hygiene, he will likely need extractions in the future, if things aren't improved, but the whole point of doing our treatment was to prevent him from getting any teeth extracted, and to try and save his teeth. the claims made by this patient's mother are not only highly inaccurate, but also egregious.

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There seems to be a miscommunication of sorts here. An extraction is when a tooth is removed from the mouth, no extractions were done on this patient. We have a copy of the consent form that was signed by this patients mother for root canal treatment. Everything is covered in the consent form, and we always provide an opportunity for any questions to be answered prior to and after signing the consent form. The patients mother keeps claiming that an extraction was done, however this service was not provided so therefore a consent form for this procedure wasn't signed. Again the patient presented with rampant decay likely due to poor diet, neglect, and poor hygiene. We restored his front teeth and did an exceptional job, as our post operative X-rays show. We are open to a peer review from another dentist to evaluate pre op and post op X-rays to confirm our diagnosis and treatment. The patient and his mother were not only rude but extremely unappreciative of the extensive work that was done to restore his front teeth. We take pride in providing every patient we see regardless of what insurance they carry the same quality of treatment and any accusation otherwise is unfounded .

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