Archived: The London Centre for Prosthodontics

The London Centre for Prosthodontics is a private practice and referral centre providing both general and specialist dental treatment. This includes restorative and prosthodontic treatment. The practice treats mostly adults and sometimes children and is situated in a central London location close to transport links.

The practice shares facilities and many of its systems and processes with another dental provider. The premises consists of a large, comfortably furnished waiting area with a separate reception area to ensure privacy and dignity for patients when discussing sensitive matters in relation to their dental treatment. The premises has five treatment rooms and a dedicated decontamination area located away from public access.

The staff structure of the practice consists of the provider, a practice manager, three other dentists, three dental nurses and a receptionist. The practice has the services of two part time dental hygienists who carry out preventative advice and treatment on prescription from the dentists working in the practice. A number of the dental nurses carry out extended duties (for which they have attended certified training courses) including taking of X-rays.

We found the practice was clean, modern and well equipped and maintained surroundings. At our visit we observed all members of staff were kind, caring and put patients at their ease and led by an effective practice management team.

Our key findings were;

• There were effective systems in place to reduce the risk and spread of infection.

• We found all treatment rooms and equipment appeared very clean.

• There were systems in place to check all equipment had been serviced regularly, including the suction compressor, autoclave, fire extinguishers, oxygen cylinder and the X-ray equipment.

• We found the dentists regularly assessed each patient’s gum health and took X-rays at appropriate intervals

• The practice had a comprehensive risk management process which was continually being updated and reviewed to ensure the safety of patients and staff members.

• The practice kept up to date with current guidelines and research.

• The governance arrangements of the practice were evidence based and developed through a process of continual learning.

We reviewed 21 comment cards that had been completed by patients. Common themes were patients felt they were listened to and their needs catered for, the environment felt safe and hygienic and staff were always friendly and caring.

There were also areas of practice where the provider could take action to make improvements;

• Ensure the justification, findings and quality assurance of X-ray images taken is recorded. We noted the provider took immediate steps on the day of our inspection to action this.

• Although we found no deficiencies in the infection prevention and control procedures, the practice should ensure their infection control processes are audited every six months (rather than annually as they currently do) to assess compliance with Department of Health guidance.