At first, I was very pleased with Dr. Nielson's practice. His technicians are all very thorough and…read morefriendly. At the time I had only experienced Dr. Nielson through brief exams.
In May of 2024 I came in for an exam due to cold sensitivity and intermittent sharp pain. Dr. Nielson performed a basic root canal cold test and did X-rays and said that I was likely grinding and clenching in my sleep from stress.
Over the next 4-6 weeks I continued to have intermittent, now excruciating pain. Due to being told by dentist that it was not a tooth injury, I assumed that it was not a dental issue and explored pain management at my PCP.
Around 5 weeks later, out of desperation, I returned to have another look. This time, Dr. Nielson said he could see a fracture with the naked eye. I begged him to extract it that day and he placed a bone graft.
At this point I was frustrated that I had been told my pain was due to stress clenching when it was the beginning of a catastrophic dental injury.
Due to financial constraints, I had not paid off my balance from the bone graft that Dr. Nielson had placed when several months later I came in for additional pain in another tooth. Dr. Nielson concluded that I needed a crown and he completed the work well, with skill, and a nice bed-side manner. At this point, despite feeling that my pain had been dismissed, I was still happy with Dr. Nielson's practice.
In an unfortunate turn of events, we lost our dental insurance in between the crown preparation and the crown placement, so it was no longer covered, leaving us with a $1400 bill.
Dr. Nielson said that he would not treat me until that balance had been paid off, citing the delay in paying for my bone graft in a timely manner.
Being low income, I set up a monthly payment plan. Regardless of having money reliably debited from my account for 12 months, Dr. Nielson would not place a crown where my extraction had been (despite me being in a temporary healing cap for over a year), nor would he allow for covered cleanings.
The moment my crown and bone graft had been paid off, the front office contacted me to schedule my crown for my extracted tooth. I hesitated, due to my experience and the distance of the practice to my home, but then I began to have intermittent pain under the tooth where Dr. Nielson had placed the crown. I made an emergency appointment.
When Dr. Nielson came in he was clearly irritated and made it very apparent that he was not happy to see me. He rushed through a cold test and then told me, once again, that I was stress grinding at that he could see a fracture. He attempted to end the visit and I decided to advocate for myself this time:
I said something like, "The last time you told me that it was stress grinding I had a crack from my crown to my root 6 weeks later and you had to extract it. Are you sure we don't need to do anything?"
He brusquely told me to buy an over the counter mouth guard and left:
Three days later, I received a letter from Dr. Nielson would no longer see me due to the deterioration of the patient-doctor relationship.
I do acknowledge that it took me a year to pay off a procedure, but it strikes me as irresponsible to refuse to treat someone while they are, reliably, and good faith, making monthly payment with the clear disclosure that they are low income.
I also feel that this an example of woman's pain being dismissed as "dramatic" or "anxiety/stressed based" when they could truly be catastrophic dental injuries.
When I advocated for my own body, I was treated with rude detachment and released from the practice.
Dr. Nielson is a skilled dentist and his hygienists are friendly and thorough.
However, the dismissal of my pain and the ultimate ending of being released from their care upon advocating for my own body lead me to give this practice a negative review and I especially caution women that their pain may be minimized.
