Mr Steven Rahman, a 53-year-old IT Specialist from St Ives, Hampshire, has been awarded £30,000 by his former long-term dentist with the help of specialist dental negligence solicitors the Dental Law Partnership. The payment was awarded after his dentist failed to diagnose two cysts in his jaw for years, leading to more complex surgeries to eventually remove them. This led to significant facial swelling, difficulty eating, weight loss, and a constant blood-filled mouth, affecting his work and social life. He now lives with anxiety that his jaw will go out of place and his teeth may fall out.
Mr Rahman was a patient of Dr Steven Williamson at Eltham Park Dental Practice, 5 Westmount Road, Eltham Park London, SE9 1JB for more than 15 years. “I’d never had problems with my teeth, but I chose to invest money to pay for private dental check-ups every six months to proactively avoid any dental issues. I regularly visited Dr Williamson for many years, since 2002, and would then double that up with a hygienist appointment straight after so I was diligent about my oral hygiene,” Mr Rahman recalled. “Every time I saw Dr Williamson I’d only spend around 5 minutes in the chair where he’d quickly have a look at my teeth, maybe take an X-ray and then send me on my way. He never flagged anything of concern.”
“In 2017, I visited Dr Williamson as the side of my jaw felt tender but after examining me, he didn’t say anything about it. The swelling on my face continued, so I decided to get checked elsewhere.” Mr Rahman explained. “When I went to a different practice as soon as they took an X-ray they saw something wrong and referred me to a specialist who found a huge cyst in my jaw. I later found out there was a second cyst on the other side too – both of which Dr Williamson had completely missed all those years.”
“I had surgery on the first cyst at the hospital, and a plastic tube was sewn into the side of my jaw for several weeks to drain the cyst. My face swelled up, and I lost sensation in my jaw, chin and lips. It was just a horrible experience,” Mr Rahman recalled. “Six months later I had another scan, at that point they realised there was a second cyst, so I also had that removed in 2020. During that surgery they had to remove the impacted wisdom teeth as well as the cyst. This caused my whole face and jaw to swell up, and I was in so much pain and discomfort. I couldn’t eat solid food for several weeks, so I lost so much weight. My mouth was constantly full of blood so I had to regularly wash it out, and I couldn’t open my jaw properly.”
“I couldn’t go out and I couldn’t work. My face had gotten so big as it swelled up horrifically, so it just ruined my social and professional life,” Mr Rahman recalled. “At the same time as all that, the cysts had eaten away at the root of some of my teeth, so I had to have root canals on three teeth. I can’t imagine what else would have happened if I hadn’t changed practices away from Dr Williamson when I did.”
Frustrated with the experiences he had gone through, Mr Rahman contacted the Dental Law Partnership in 2020. Further analysis of his records revealed the extent of the poor dental treatment Mr Rahman received from Dr Williamson, where he failed to diagnose and treat the two cysts when they were small in 2007 which eventually resulted in the need for complex surgery and painful post-op recovery, with long lasting damage to his teeth and jaw, much of which could have been avoided.
“The whole experience was just so stressful. I still randomly have intermittent jaw pain, and I feel that I can’t open my jaw wide. This means I can’t eat food properly otherwise it feels like my jaw will go out of place, so I have needed to cut food down to bitesize pieces. There’s been clicking in my ears, and even though the sensation in my lips and chin has come back, I still bite the side of my mouth regularly by accident,” Mr Rahman explained. “I don’t like anyone coming near my head or jaw as I feel it’s so fragile and I fear people knocking it. Last year I had an infection near the three teeth that had root canals and I am concerned that they may need to be extracted in the future. Luckily, they’ve settled down but I’m just so scared and anxious of needing further dental work or these teeth coming loose and just falling out.”
“As a patient who paid to have regular checkups to pre-empt any dental problems for over 20 years, I put my trust in dental professionals like Dr Williamson and relied on his expertise. I’m just so disappointed and don’t understand how he couldn’t have noticed the cysts developing over the years,” Mr Rahman said.
Tim Armitage of the Dental Law Partnership commented: “The distress and symptoms our client has experienced were largely unnecessary. If the dentist involved had provided more satisfactory treatment, our client’s problems may have been avoided.”
The Dental Law Partnership took on Mr Rahman’s case in 2020. The case was successfully settled in April 2025 when Mr Rahman was paid £30,000 in an out of court settlement. The dentist involved denied liability. Any patients who believe they may have received negligent dental care can use the Dental Law Partnership’s compensation calculator to see the likelihood of a successful claim and how much they could receive in compensation.
