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It is a
pleasure to welcome dentists back to Kilbirnie who care about the NHS ethos
and who will provide a service to local people.
This new practice in Kilbirnie is a welcome addition
to those other dentists in the area who continued to provide quality dental
care to NHS patients who had been forced to travel out of their own
community.
Local MSP Allan Wilson was
on hand to welcome one of the new owners of Kilbirnie Dental Centre, Ronnie
Hay, to the town in order to advertise the fact that it is once more opening
its doors to NHS patients.
Mr Wilson, who had a well publicised dispute with the centre's previous
owner over his refusal to treat NHS patients said: "It is a pleasure to
welcome dentists back to Kilbirnie who care about the NHS ethos and who will
provide a service to local people irrespective of their ability to pay
private dental charges.
"Like many other local people I refused to be browbeaten into paying bogus
membership fees or other inflated charges for a service that should be
available on the NHS. I am therefore delighted that Ronnie Hay has restored
that choice in this practice."
Mr Wilson added: "We have allocated £295 million additional funding for
dentistry and oral health and over £237m of this additional cash goes
directly to supporting frontline dental services for those dentists who
remain loyal to the NHS and put their patients before profits.”
"Other initiatives include training more dentists: introducing a bursary
scheme for students which commits them to NHS dentistry for five years after
graduation: more flexible employment arrangements to retain older dentists
and grants for dentists establishing or expanding NHS practices”.
"This new practice in Kilbirnie is a welcome addition to those other
dentists in the area who continued to provide quality dental care to NHS
patients who had been forced to travel out of their own community to receive
NHS treatment" said Mr Wilson.
New owner of the practice, Mr Hay, said: "We have been successful in
securing the services of four NHS dentists so that we can keep the practice
open for six days a week. We also have secured the services of two
hygienists and we hope that this notification of our intention to treat NHS
patients will be welcomed by local people.”
"The practice has undergone extensive modernisation including the
installation of a new ground floor surgery and we intend to deliver a high
quality service for NHS patients as well as some additional services
privately" said Mr Hay.
Mr Hay and partner have successfully opened new practices in Glasgow and
Fife and want to extend NHS services more widely across West Central
Scotland.
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