Birmingham Family Dental Services / Malpractice!

I had been going to this dental facility for years and so had many of my friends and my sister. For some reason I was being told over and over that I needed all these root canals and I could not for the life of me figure out why. I thought to myself that they were the experts and so I trusted them and did exactly as they had told me to even though my husband and I didn't have dental insurance. (Which they full well knew) I was sent back and forth and had MANY root canals (more than you could count) and had also found out that friends and my sister were having the same thing done. It wasn't really brought to my attention until I had a tooth extracted and they said I'd need a bridge with a "fake" tooth placed on it so because my teeth were so bad on the bottom in the back. So I went through with the extraction of the tooth and I let the dentist Dr. Gentry Gonzales know that we didn't have a lot of money anymore from all the root canals and crowns that they've already done. He informed me that once I get the money up to come back and he would evaluate my teeth than and let me know if we could still do the permanent bridge. I explained to him that it could be awhile before my husband and I got that money up. He said just to let him know when. Well a year or so later I came back with all the money and told him I was ready. He quickly sat me down and looked over my remaining teeth and had an impression done and said he'd call me when the permanent bridge came in. Awhile went by and I finally got a call to come and have the permanent bridge placed on. When I arrived there from the time I came with the money to when the permanent bridge was back Dr. Gonzales NEVER did an x-ray! He placed the bridge on and sent me on my way. Shortly after he had done that blisters the size of my pinky finger were coming up on my gums and were VERY painful. I went back to him and he said I had sensitive gums and it would go away soon. So I kept waiting for it to go away but it never did. I finally went to another dentist and she did many x-rays and told me that in all of her dentistry she's never had to break news like this. She told me that the dentist who put the permanent bridge on did not clean the decay before placing it on and the teeth had rotted so much so that only a fraction of a tooth was holding the bridge on. She told me what to do about all of this because I was going to have to have the other 2 remaining teeth extracted and than have a surgery done to where titanium plates were placed in and than I'd have to wait 6 months or more for healing than the permanent bridge could be placed on. I was told it would cost us around $10,000.00!!! Out of our own pockets!! I went and got the written records but they would not give me my x-rays nor make a photocopy of them. I took the written ones back to this new dentist and was told to submit a claim to the board of dentistry. I did that but was replied back to that they had got letters from all dentists involved and by what was written they did not violate any laws. Now by this time I've had 4 attorney's and a dentist tell me that I have a sufficient claim and could sue but they didn't know how much money they (the attorney's) would get from the lawsuit for sure so they were afraid to try it because there is such a great umbrella covering doctors and and dentist's from malpractice lawsuits that you'd need at least $150,000.00 just to start the process!!! I could not believe my ears! So the real evidence that I submitted didn't matter at all just the dentist's letters back to the board of dentistry!!! They all cover for each other. So now my family AGAIN has to pay for there mistakes! They also told me that in the back of the top of my mouth that those teeth all three needed to have root canals done and when this new dentist did x-rays I was told I only had a small cavity under a filling on ONE of those teeth and the other two were fine! So I'm tired of sitting back and just allowing companies like this to do this to people and get away with it!!! I am no longer sitting back I WILL NOT STOP until justice is served!!!! BEWARE OF THIS COMPANY----- BIRMINGHAM FAMILY DENTAL SERVICES!!! They will take FULL advantage of you!!!