APPLE DENTIST ripoff!!! I WENT TO APPLE DENTIST AND THEY TRIED TO CHARGE ME $800 TO JUST DO A BASIC CLEANING HOUSTON Texas

Anyone who has a complaint against a dentist in the state of Texas may file a complaint with the Texas State Board of Dental Examiners in Austin, Texas.

The board has a strict list of guidelines that dentists must follow in diagnosis, treatment, and in general office management and maintenance. The board has investigators who are licensed peace officers who are authorized by law to obtain any information from any source in order to investigate the complaint. Although it is seldom done, the board has the legal right to examine a complaining dental patient though use of its member dentists, who are appointed by the governor to determine the exact situation in a patient's dentition. The board can appear at a dentist's office, if it is warranted, and examine any of his records, or the office itself. It can also demand copies of all the records, and may investigate anything at all, even things that are not mentioned in the complaint. Because of this, disgruntled patients often file complaints that are later found to be baseless. However, since dental patients are dependent upon dentists for professiional diagnosis and care, the Board is required to investigate every single complaint that it receives, regardless of the investigator's personal feelings about the complaint as written, and a report has to be filed with the Board Secretary, who recommends disciplinary action when the facts indicate that it is  necessary.

Patients who go to a specific dentist because they have been referred to him or her by their closed-panel HMO dental plans can complain to the dental plan -- the only recourse that the dental plan usually has is to boot the dentist off the plan, if this appears to be warranted.

The State Board does not handle collection complaints. If a patient has legally consented to dental treatment, and the fees charged for that treatment are the usual, customary, and reasonable fees of that locale, and the treatment was warranted diagnostically, the Board does not order refunds to patients who are unhappy with their treatment. It can, when warranted, reprimand the dentist, suspend the dentist's license temporarily, revoke the dentist's license permanently, or fine him and apply the funds to its administrative costs, just as a court does.

The best way to pick a dentist is to ask your friends and neighbors to recommend a good dentist to you. All dentists are required to be competent and capable, but that does not mean that you will like any particular random dentist or be comfortable physically or emotionally with their manners and treatment style.  If you do not remember your dentist's name after the first visit, it is a bad sign.