Our Services

• We continue to prioritise dental care for those experiencing urgent dental problems, such as swelling, severe dental pain, or dental trauma.  If you have a general query regarding your referral to our service or an appointment that may have been cancelled please bear with us and we will contact you when we are able to offer you an appointment.

   

 

 

Worcestershire Community Dental Service delivers:

 

• Urgent dental care for patients who do not have their own dentist
• Special Care Dentistry
• Paediatric Dentistry

The service consists of two consultants:

• Claire Castle Burrows - Consultant in Special Care Dentistry
• Sophie Hughes – Consultant in Paediatric Dentistry

Urgent Care – for patients who do not have their own dentist

People who do not have their own dentist but have an urgent dental problem should call our urgent dental triage line on 01905 681626 for further advice, the lines are open from 09:00 - 12:00, Monday to Friday.  Please be aware that following triage you may not be offered an appointment.  We no longer accept walk-in patients; all face-to-face dental appointments are by appointment only.

If you attend a general dental practice, please contact your practice for further advice.        

Serious concerns

Please go to your local Emergency Department or call 999 immediately if you experience any of the following:

• Uncontrollable bleeding following dental extractions
• Rapidly increasing swelling around the throat or eye
• Severe trauma to the face and jaw    

Urgent out of hours dental treatment 

Outside of the Worcestershire CDS working hours, please contact the NHS 111 service.

(The NHS 111 service is for when you need urgent care or advice but when it's not a 999 emergency. It is available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and calls are free from landlines and mobile phones.)

Special Care and Paediatric Dentistry

We are a referral-based service, so please only contact us to make an appointment if you attend the service routinely, or have been referred

The following services are provided:

• Paediatric Dentistry
• Special Care Dentistry
• Dental Anxiety Management
• Domiciliary Care
• Oral Health Promotion

The service provides sedation for children and adults to support their dental care and can support a pathway of care for general anaesthesia for patients that require more specialised dental care in a hospital environment.

To make the service fully accessible facilities include:

• Domiciliary visits
• Wheelchair accessible clinics, to include;

• Hoists
• Specialist dental chair for wheelchair users

• Loop systems
• Interpreting services

After an initial assessment, treatment may be provided at any of our clinics throughout Worcestershire, including;

• Worcester 01905 681625
• Evesham 01386 502453
• Kidderminster 01562 514515
• Redditch 01527 488611
• Malvern 01684 612754

Find a Minor Injury Unit (MIU) Find a MIU

Appointments:

• We continue to review our waiting lists
• We would like to advise this may still mean a lengthy wait dependent on your clinical need. Please be assured you will be contacted by our Central Referrals Department as soon as we can offer you an appointment.

·       New referrals continue to be accepted. Referrals from GDPs are only accepted via REGO

·       Referrals can only be made by health care professionals.

• If you are currently on our waiting list and have received treatment elsewhere and no longer require an appointment from our service or need to cancel an appointment, please inform the relevant clinic urgently or the Central referrals team.

If you need to cancel an appointment please give us at least 24 hours’ notice. If you cancel two appointments in a row, we may discharge you back to your referrer. This information may be shared with our safeguarding team or other agencies involved in your care.

Information for professionals

The service provides Consultant Led specialist dentistry to people from vulnerable groups, whose needs may not be accommodated in NHS general dental services, including;

• people with moderate/severe and profound multiple learning disabilities;
• people with moderate/severe physical and/or communication impairment;
• people with moderate/severe chronic mental health conditions including dementia;
• people with complex medical conditions;
• people with severe dental anxiety or dental phobias;

We also provide paediatric dentistry to children from vulnerable groups, whose needs may not be accommodated in NHS general dental services, including;

• children with moderate/severe and profound multiple learning disabilities;
• children with moderate/severe physical and/or communication impairment;
• children with moderate/severe chronic mental health conditions;
• children with complex medical conditions;
• children with severe dental anxiety or dental phobias;
• children with moderate or severe behavioural problems;
• children in need and subject to a child protection plan with additional or complex needs;
• looked after children with additional or complex needs;
• children with clefts, abnormalities of dental development or dental trauma of increased complexity;
• children with other complex dental conditions.

Other vulnerable groups who may need to access our service for some, or all, of their care includes;

• socially excluded people, for example homeless, migrants, asylum seekers, refugees, gypsies, travellers and sex workers;
• people with drug or alcohol addiction problems;
• people in secure units

How to make a referral

Referrals are only accepted from;

• General Dental Practitioners      
• General Medical Practitioners
• Any other health or social care professional
• Paediatric referral criteria

For General Dental Practitioners, please submit your referral via REGO including any relevant medical history, mobility requirements such as hoist or wheelchair tipper and copies of radiographs. Please inform us if the patient requires an interpreter. 

If a patient requires a domiciliary (home) visit, please complete the Domiciliary Community Dental Referral Form

Community Dental Referral Form

Your referral may be rejected if there is insufficient information

Once completed, referral forms should be emailed to: whcnhs.communitydental@nhs.net