At Slipshoe Street Dental Practise we take our patients confidentiality and
feedback seriously and want to make people are aware of the policies we put
in place to make sure this happens.
Privacy Notice
The Practice aims to meet the requirements of the Data Protection Act 2018, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the guidelines on the Information Commissioner's website as well as our professional guidelines and requirements. This Privacy Notice is available by contacting the surgery.
You will be asked to provide personal information when joining the Practice. The purpose of us processing this data is to provide optimum health care to you.
The categories of data we process are:
-Personal data for the purposes of staff and self-employed team member management.
-Special category data including health records for the purposes of the delivery of health care.
-Special category date including health records and details of criminal record checks for managing employees and contracted team members.
We never pass your personal details to a third party unless we have a contract for them to process data on our behalf and will otherwise keep it confidential. If we intend to refer a patient to another practitioner or to secondary care such as a hospital we will gain the individual's permission before the referral is made and the personal data is shared.
The retention period for special data in patient records is a minimum of 10 years and may be longer for complex records in order to meet our legal requirements.
You have the following personal data right:
- The right to be informed
- The right of access
- The right to rectification
- The right to erasure (clinical records must be retained for a certain time period)
- The right to restrict processing
- The right to data portability
- The right to object
If you are a patient of the practice you have the right to withdraw consent for important notifications, newsletters, surveys or marketing. You can inform us to correct errors in your personal details or withdraw consent from communication methods such as telephone, email or text. You have the right to obtain a free copy of your patient records within one month.
If you are not a patient of the practice you have the right to withdraw consent for processing personal data, to have a free copy of it within one month, to correct errors in it or to ask us to delete it. You can also withdraw consent from communication methods such as telephone, email or text.
If you have a suggestion or complaint about your data processing please contact the surgery on
slipshoestdental@btconnect.com, or call
01737 221750 or by writing to us at 6 Slipshoe Street, Reigate, Surrey, RH2 9HU. We take complaints very seriously.
Privacy Notice for Children
The Practice keeps records of your name, address, date of birth and details of any health problems as well as details of your dental treatment and details about your family. We keep this information so that we can provide you with the best dental care. Your personal information is kept very confidentially and securely. We only use your personal information so we can give you the best dental care and for sending reminders to you.
We only pass your personal information to another dentist, doctor or hospital if you have a problem that needs their special skills and you need to go and see them. We will not give your information to anyone else unless the law allows us to or we have to provide it for legal reasons.
If you leave the practice, we will stop using your information but will keep it confidentially and securely until you are 25 years old, when we will review if and when we can delete it. You can always ask for a copy of the information we hold for you, we can transfer it to another dentist or doctor at your request and you can ask us to stop using your personal information to send letters or contact you in other ways if you are no longer a patient at the practice.
When you reach 18 years of age the Privacy Notice about how we process your personal information will change to the adult version. This can be found on this website.
If you would like a copy of the information we hold about you or if you have any other queries about it such as to change an error in your information or to provide a copy of your information to somebody else please contact
the practice on 01737 221750 or email: slipshoestdental@btconnect.com.
NHS Dental Care Rules
It is important to follow the rules of the practice to ensure you have continued access to NHS dental
care. We do not charge patients for missed or short notice cancellations, but we can decline to
rebook patients for NHS appointments if this occurs more than once. If you miss your first
appointment with us, without reasonable explanation, then we will be unlikely to offer you another
appointment on the NHS. If you miss, cancel on short notice, or arrive late for your appointment
then we can decline future appointments.
It is important to attend for regular appointments. Your dentist will recommend a recall interval
between 6 and 24 months based on your oral health. If you fail to attend or make an appointment
for a number of years, we cannot accept responsibility for your continued care on the NHS and we
may only be able to see you on a private basis.
If you fail to pay for your dental treatment in full when requested we will decline NHS treatment and
appointments.
If you do repeatedly cancel appointments on short notice (2 business days) or arrive late, then we
may not be able to offer you future appointments on the NHS. At this stage, you may wish to register
at another dental practice that offers you NHS care, or you can stay registered with us as a private
patient. In these circumstances, you may be asked to pay for your appointment in advance or pay a
deposit. Failure to provide the necessary notice or missing the appointment will mean your deposit
is forfeited. Out of courtesy we do make every effort to remind patients about their appointments
with text messages and phone calls, but we cannot accept responsibility if they are not received by
patients.
These rules are a summary of our main operating policy but not exhaustive and there may be
additional matters that determine your NHS registration.
Practice Update
We regret to inform patients that our NHS Dental Services currently remain very restricted and
understaffed. NHS England and the government have unfortunately continued to underfund NHS
Dentistry, which has led to a dramatic exodus of dentists and nurses from the service.
We make every effort to continue seeing our regular patients on the NHS though waiting times may
be longer. If you were previously treated on the NHS by a dentist who is no longer at the practice,
you may be without a dentist who can offer you NHS care.
If you would like to explore options for dental care outside of the NHS then please speak to a
member of our team to assist you on this matter.
We would like to thank our patients for their understanding and cooperation in this matter and look
forward to seeing them as they return to the dental practice.
We are currently experiencing a very high volume of calls, so please accept our apologies if we are
unable to answer your call straight away. You are able to send an email to
slipshoestdental@btconnect.com.
Patient Complaints Procedure
If you do not feel you can raise a complaint about your NHS service directly with us, you can address your complaint directly to NHS England at england.contactus@nhs.net with 'For the attention of the complaints team' in the subject line. Ms Maria Bojarska is the Complaint Manager and will be your personal contact to assist you with any complaints. If your verbal complaint is not resolved to your satisfaction within 24 hours or if you complain in writing, the Complaints Manager will acknowledge it in
writing within three working days and will aim to provide
a full response in writing as soon as practical.
Contacts
For private dental treatment you can contact the GDC private dental complaints service within 12 months of treatment or within 12 months of becoming aware of the issue by calling 020 8253 0800 or visiting www.dentalcomplaints.org.uk.
If you are still unhappy about your NHS complaint, you can contact The Care Quality Commission (CQC) who regulates private and NHS dental care services in England by calling 03000 616161. They can take action against a service provider that is not meeting their standards The General Dental Council is responsible for regulating all dental professionals You can complain using their online form at www.gdc-uk.org contact them on information@gdc-org.uk or by calling 020 7167 6000.
