At the time of our inspection we noted that this service mainly dealt with patients who were referred for specialist treatment by their own dentist. (We noted that the service only operated for one and a half days a week.) On the day of our inspection there were no patients being treated. We saw that the Consultant Dentist at this service took account of treatment or condition information from the referring dentist.

We sampled treatment plans and saw that options had been explained and recorded. We saw that records included details of the patients' medical history and that these were routinely updated. We saw that follow up letters recorded information about patients continuing oral health.

We saw documents which confirmed that all professionally practicing staff held registrations with the appropriate professional bodies. We also saw documents which confirmed that staff employed by the service held checks with the Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) or with the new Disclosure and Baring Service, (DBS).

We saw that the practice was clean and well maintained and we were shown an up to date Legionella test certificate.

We looked at the records for staff and saw an example of the continuing professional development (CPD) training that a dental nurse was in the process of completing. There were CPD records linked to the person’s General Dental Council Registration.

Information was provided to patients about the complaints system operated by the provider; we saw that complaints had been responded to formally and that the provider endeavoured to reach satisfactory outcomes.