NHS Dental Crisis: Patients Pull Teeth Amid Urgent Care Shortage

Published: 15 December 2025. The English Chronicle Desk. The English Chronicle Online.

A growing number of people in England are resorting to pulling their own teeth due to a lack of accessible urgent dental care, a new report from Healthwatch England has revealed. Despite NHS guidance ensuring urgent care should be available, many patients report being left in extreme pain, sometimes resorting to dangerous self-treatment to manage their condition.

The watchdog’s research found that patients experiencing sudden dental emergencies such as broken teeth, severe abscesses, or acute pain often cannot secure timely appointments with their NHS dentist or through NHS 111. Some patients are traveling over 100 miles, paying hundreds of pounds for private care, or even traveling abroad to receive urgent dental treatment.

Healthwatch England highlighted that access to routine dental care is already limited, with patients often waiting months for appointments. The lack of preventative treatment pushes urgent dental care to become the default pathway, leaving patients suffering avoidable pain and risking more serious health complications.

In an official blog, Healthwatch England noted, “People across England tell us they are unable to sign up with an NHS dentist for routine care. Even when they have been taken on as regular patients, many people wait months for routine appointments. We have repeatedly highlighted these significant issues with accessing NHS dentists.”

The government has pledged to provide 700,000 additional urgent dental appointments annually through 2028-29. Official guidance states that urgent cases should receive appointments within 24 hours or seven days, depending on severity, either with a patient’s regular NHS dentist or via NHS 111’s coordination.

Recent NHS 111 data shows a 20% increase in dental-related calls between July and September 2025 compared with the previous year. Healthwatch’s own mystery shopping investigations revealed that volunteers sometimes made 15 calls to urgent care services without finding a single available appointment.

Patients described long, frustrating attempts to access urgent NHS dental care, including hours on hold to NHS 111 and repeated referrals that ultimately yielded no appointments. For those who did manage to access urgent care, relief was often short-lived.

Healthwatch stated, “When urgent dental services shift from being a safety net to the default route for care, prevention is neglected, and patients suffer. People report extreme pain, sleepless nights, and worsening dental health. Many feel forced to pay hundreds or even thousands of pounds for private treatment, borrow from family or use pensions and benefits to cover costs.”

Patients also report long journeys to access urgent care, sometimes traveling 110 miles or more for treatment, and some have even traveled abroad. Others admitted resorting to self-treatment, including pulling teeth or using unprescribed antibiotics, highlighting significant risks to health.

The watchdog has called for monthly reporting from the NHS Business Services Authority on progress toward the 700,000 urgent appointments target. It also recommended reforms to establish a legal right to register with an NHS dentist, strengthen prevention, improve patient pathways, and enable long-term planning for dental care services.

A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “This government inherited an NHS dental system decayed after years of neglect. We are working hard to turn things around, rolling out extra urgent dental appointments and reforming the dental contract to increase capacity and get more NHS dentists on the frontline. There is more to do but this government is determined to fix Britain’s broken dental sector.”

The situation underscores an ongoing dental crisis in England, reflecting systemic challenges in capacity, access, and the balance between urgent and preventative care. Without urgent reforms, patients may continue facing extreme pain, costly private treatment, and dangerous self-management of dental emergencies.