People needing emergency dental care in England are being denied help from the NHS despite guidance saying that it should be available, in some cases resorting to risky self-treatment such as pulling out their own teeth, the patient watchdog has found.
Patients who experience a sudden dental crisis such as a broken tooth, abscess or severe tooth pain are meant to be able to get help from their dentist or by calling NHS 111.
But research by Healthwatch England shows that people in pain are unable to get an appointment and in some cases are being forced to travel more than 100 miles, spend hundreds of pounds going private or even travel abroad to get care.
In some cases people are turning to self-treatment including pulling out teeth or taking unprescribed antibiotics.
The Department of Health and Social Care has been contacted for comment.
In a blog, Healthwatch England said: “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 at an NHS dentist, many people wait months for a routine appointment. We have repeatedly highlighted these significant issues with accessing NHS dentists.”
As a result, problems are not being prevented or treated early enough, and urgent care becomes the only form of dental care people can access.
The government has committed to delivering 700,000 additional urgent appointments a year through to 2028-29.
In a dental emergency people should be able to get an urgent appointment within 24 hours or seven days, depending on the symptoms. Sometimes this is through a person’s regular NHS dentist, or via an urgent appointment arranged by calling 111, who may have details of practices that will see urgent cases.
NHS 111 data shows that calls about dental issues in England have risen recently. Between July and September 2025, call volumes were about 20% higher than in the same period the previous year.
When local Healthwatch teams in the north-east recently conducted mystery shopping calls to urgent services, volunteers made up to 15 calls without finding any available urgent care.
People told the watchdog about long and exhausting attempts to secure an urgent NHS dentist appointment. For some, this meant hours spent on hold to 111, while for others it meant being referred to urgent care and then being told that no appointments were available.
Elsewhere, the watchdog found when patients managed to get urgent dental treatment, the relief was only temporary.
The blog said: “When urgent dental services shift from being a safety net for occasional crises to a default route for care, prevention is neglected, and patients suffer.”
It added: “People report extreme pain, sleepless nights and worsening dental health. Many people feel forced to pay hundreds or thousands of pounds for private treatment, borrow money from family and friends, or use their pensions or benefits to cover costs.
“Practices offering urgent dental appointments are often located far from people’s homes. People have described journeys of up to 110 miles, round trips taking two to five hours, with some even travelling abroad for treatment. Some people told us they resorted to self-treatment or unprescribed antibiotics, raising serious risks.”
The watchdog has made a number of recommendations, including calling for the NHS Business Services Authority to publish monthly progress data on the 700,000 urgent appointments target. As part of dental contract reform, it says the government should introduce a legal right for people to register with an NHS dentist to improve access, strengthen prevention and patient pathways and support long-term planning.
A Department of Health and Social Care spokesperson said: “This government inherited a 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.”
