"Lack of local emergency dental cover"

I needed a dentist due to a dental emergency so called my local dentist in Skye and Lochalsh. Leaflets produced by NHS Highland clearly state that you can see a dentist locally in an emergency. The phones at both the Dental Department at Lochalsh Healthcare Centre and the Medical Reception at Lochalsh Healthcare Centre was either constantly engaged or had a message saying that the telephone line was temporarily out of order.

As I have found, NHS Highland have had problems with various local healthcare building's telephones being out of order in the past few weeks, I telephoned my local hospital and was told there was a temporary telephone line I should be calling at Lochalsh Healthcare Centre. I telephoned the number and the person who answered the phone said that they were not a member of the medical staff and that there was no one else in the building. They advised me to phone NHS 24 on 111 for a dental emergency appointment.

NHS 24 said they didn't cover dental issues and that I had to contact NHS Inform. They told me I had to call an emergency Highland dental line. I telephoned the number and got through to someone in Inverness and was told that the dentists were on holiday today and that unless I could travel to Inverness (almost a 200 mile return trip) then I couldn't see anyone. I explained that I was disabled and used a powered wheelchair but could not possibly make the journey to Inverness and back as public transport is inaccessible to me and I could not drive that distance. I explained that I normally have to use Patient Transport. I asked how I could get something for the pain and was told bluntly that I couldn't unless I could make the almost 200 mile round trip to Inverness today.

The person I spoke to repeatedly interrupted me (clearly unable or unwilling to allow me to finish a sentence) and, at one stage, told me to stop shouting. I wasn't - I had to explain to her that I was using a speaker phone as I could not actually hold a telephone because of my disability and asked them to understand that I was not shouting but I did have to speak so they could hear me. They appeared to show no understanding that I could not make the journey and didn't even ask if I would need to have a carer accompany me.

The caring profession seems not to care anymore. No pain relief and no reasonable adjustments under the Equality Act 2010 for people with disabilities. This centralisation does not work in remote rural areas and, as a result, the patients NHS Highland have a duty of care for in remote rural areas, suffer. Had I lived elsewhere in Skye and Lochalsh, I would be expected to make a journey of at least 280 miles to see the emergency dentist (which is even longer than having to travel, say, from Glasgow to Manchester!). To anyone else elsewhere in the country, this would be unthinkable. To NHS Highland - it seems that we just to have to put up with such barbaric treatment.

This is a disgrace and NHS Highland need to understand that they are asking people the impossible in order to obtain their dental emergency services at the point of provision. I am not impressed. They could do, and should do, a whole lot better! I think starting to care for the people you have a duty of care to would be a start.