Practice Policy 

Crown House Dental Practice
Data Protection

Keeping Your Records

This practice complies with the 1998 Data Protection Act and this policy describes our procedures for ensuring that personal information about patients is processed fairly and lawfully.

What personal data do we hold?

In order to provide you with a high standard of dental care and attention, we need to hold personal information about you. This personal data comprises:

• your past and current medical and dental condition; personal details such as your age, national insurance number/NHS number, address, telephone number and your general medical practitioner
• radiographs, clinical photographs and study models
• information about the treatment that we have provided or propose to provide and its cost
• notes of conversations/incidents that might occur for which a record needs to be kept
• records of consent to treatment
• correspondence relating to you with other health care professionals, for example in the hospital or community services

Why do we hold information about you?

We need to keep comprehensive and accurate personal data about our patients in order to provide them with safe and appropriate dental care. We also need to process personal data about you in order to provide care under NHS arrangements and to ensure the proper management and administration of the NHS.

How we process the data

We will process personal data that we hold about you in the following way:

• Retaining information We will retain your dental records whilst you are a practice patient and after you cease to be a patient, for at least eleven years or, for children, until age 25, whichever is the longer.
• Security of information Personal data about you is held in the practice’s computer system and/or in a manual filing system. The information is not accessible to the public and only authorised members of staff have access to it.
• Our computer system has secure audit trails and we back up information routinely.
• Disclosure of information In order to provide proper and safe dental care, we may need to disclose personal information about you to:


• your general medical practitioner
• the hospital or community dental services
• other health professionals caring for you
• NHS payment authorities
• The Inland Revenue
• The Benefits Agency, where you are claiming exemption or remission from NHS charges
• Private dental schemes of which you are a member

Crown House Dental Practice
Consent Policy

Decisions requiring patient consent

Examples of decisions that require

Carrying out examinations and diagnostic tests, including soft tissue exams, perio charting, vitality testing, cold testing, taking photographs, taking x-rays etc- Administration of tropical and injectable local anaest.

We Involve patients in decisions about their care and, before embarking on any aspect of patient care, we seek their consent to do so – recognising the rights of patients to decide what happens to their bodies.

We recognise that patients have the rights to refuse advice or treatment.

Informed Consent:

Consent can only be obtained by someone who has sufficient information about the patients and the treatment options they are considering, including the risks, benefits and alternative options. In practice, this means that only the dentist or the hygienist can obtain consent to treatment from a patient.
We aim to provide each patient with sufficient information, in a way that they can understand, to allow them to make a decision about their care. We use various communication tools to ensure that the patients understands what is being suggested in particular, we:

• Show patients their X-rays and explain what we’ve found on them;
• Use models to explain disease process and treatment options
• Ensure we have to date information and animation on our website to help patients understand their choices

In our discussions with patients, we explore what they want to know to help them make their decisions and explain –

• Why we feel the treatment is necessary:
• The risks and benefits of the proposed treatment
• What might happen if the treatment is not carried out and the alternative treatment options and their risks and benefits.

We encourage patients to ask questions and aim to provide honest and full answers. We always allow patients time to make their decisions. We always make sure that the patients understand they are being treated privately and what costs will be. Where patients embark on a course of treatment, we ask if they want a written a treatment plan and cost estimate; we provide one wherever we are asked to. Where changes to the treatment plan are needed, we obtain the patients agreement and consent, including to any changes in the cost. The patient is asked if they require an amended treatment plan and estimate and this is provided when asked for.

Voluntary decision making

Decisions about their care must be made by the patient, and without pressure. Most people will feel able to reach decisions and give consent fair and quickly – usually at the same appointment where treatment is recommended. However, patients must always be given much additional time as they feel they need in order to reach a decision.

We respect the patients right to - refuse to give treatment and change their minds after they have given consent.

When this occurs we will not put pressure on the patients to reconsider but where we feel it is important, we will inform the patient of the consequences of not accepting treatment and explore with them any further alternatives that may be available.

Ability to give Consent

Every person aged 16 or over has the right to make their own decisions and is assumed to be able to do so, unless they show otherwise.

• Children under 16 years  May be able to give informed consent to examination and treatment, too. We always try to involve children in discussions about their treatment, even if they are not able to give fully informed consent on their own.
• If the child is able to make decisions about their treatment and wishes to do so, we will respect their privacy and right of confidentiality – in other words, if a 15 year old is competent to make decisions for themselves, we will respect their right to do so and will not share information about their treatment with their parents without their permission. Where we have doubts about a patients ability to give informed consent, we will seek advice from our defence organisation.

Complaints handling policy

At Crown House Dental Practice we take complaints very seriously because we want all our patients to be delighted with our service. If a patient makes a complaint, it is important to us that this is dealt with courteously and promptly so that the matter is resolved as quickly as possible. Our aim is to react to complaints in the way in which we would want our own complaint about a service to be handled, to learn from any mistakes we make and to respond to patients' concerns in a caring and sensitive way. This policy sets out the procedures we will follow to ensure that we achieve these objectives.

Encouraging feedback and complaints

We encourage our patients to give feedback and, where they are unhappy, to make a complaint if we haven't met their expectations. We want to stress that this is important to us because it helps us to improve the service we provide.

Patients will not be discriminated against for making a complaint and it will not have a negative effect on their treatment.

Where it is requested, advice and advocacy support will be provided to those who require it. Even if it is not requested, we may offer to arrange such assistance where it appears to us that this may be appropriate in the circumstances.

Overall responsibility

The person with overall responsibility for dealing with complaints is the Practice Manager, Peyul Patel. However, any patient wishing to make a complaint should not hesitate to raise the matter with any member of the practice team, as they prefer.

Verbal complaints (telephone or face-to-face)

If a patient makes a verbal complaint, the member of staff they are speaking to will listen to the patient and, if they are able, immediately attempt to remedy the problem. If this is not possible, or if the patient is asking for something that the staff member is not authorised to provide (for example, a refund of treatment fees), the staff member should contact the Practice Manager immediately so that he can deal with the matter. If the Practice Manager is not available, the patient will be told when he will be and/or that arrangements will be made for him to contact them (and when this will happen). The member of staff will take brief details of the complaint and pass them on to the Practice Manager. If the patient is unhappy with this, or is not able or prepared to wait, then arrangements will be made for the Principle to deal with the matter in the Practice Managers absence.

Written complaints (letter or email)

Written complaints, whether in a letter or an email, will be passed immediately to the Practice Manager for him to deal with.

Complaints relating to clinical care or associated charges will usually be referred to the dentist unless the patient does not want this to happen.

We will acknowledge the complaint in writing within 3 practice working days. We will provide a full response (with redress or details of action to be taken, where appropriate) within 10 practice working days. If this is not possible for any reason, we will notify the patient, giving reasons for the delay and the likely period within which the investigation will be completed.

The full response may initially be given at a meeting or by telephone if the patient prefers and confirmed in writing.

Records

We will keep proper and comprehensive records of any complaints we receive, responses we give and any action taken.

Where a patient is not satisfied with the outcome

Where a patient is not satisfied with the response to a complaint, they may refer the matter to:

The Dental Complaints Service, The Lansdowne Building, 2 Lansdowne Road, Croydon, Greater London, CR9 2ER, telephone 08456 120540 - for complaints about private treatment

The Care Quality Commission, Finsbury Tower, 103-105 Bunhill Row, London, EC1Y 8TG, telephone 03000 616161 - the general health regulator, with responsibility for maintaining standards in healthcare services

The General Dental Council, 37 Wimpole Street, London, W1M 8DQ, telephone 0845 222 4141 - the dentists' regulatory body, which deals with complaints about professional misconduct

Patient Waiting Time

Here at Crown House Dental Practice, We Value your time therefore we endeavour to see patients at there scheduled appointment time.

Below is the results of we performed for the month of January 2012