At our last inspection in October 2012 we found the provider did not have a suitable recruitment procedure and had not carried out robust background checks before appointing one of the staff at the practice.

At this inspection we found improvements had been made. Although no new appointments had been made, we found the provider now had a robust recruitment process in place. This demonstrated relevant background checks would be carried out to make sure all new staff appointed at the practice were suitable to work with vulnerable people. Background checks had now been carried out for all existing staff.

We spoke with people in the waiting room within the practice. Everybody we spoke with talked positively about the care and treatment they had received at the practice. One person had just seen the dentist prior to speaking with us and said they'd had "A good experience." Another person told us they had been visiting the practice for over 25 years and said “It’s like a home from home.” All of the people we spoke with said they had no grounds for complaint.

We found people were involved in making decisions about their treatment and consent was gained before treatment commenced.

Staff were aware of their roles and responsibilities with regards to protecting people from abuse or the risk of abuse. They were able to provide us with a range of potential signs of abuse and knew how to react to these should the situation arise.

There were effective systems in place to reduce the risk and spread of infection.

People we spoke with were very complimentary about the staff who worked in the practice. One person said their dentist was “Quite nice, alright” and another person said their dentist “Has a good chair-side manner.” However we found the provider had not completed a CRB check for one of the dental staff and did not operate effective recruitment procedures.

We saw the provider sought the views of patients by asking them to complete a questionnaire. Responses from patients were generally positive.