PLATINUM PRACTICE

Smiles Better

Currently accepting new private patients and dentist referrals

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2-4 Baker Street, Abergavenny, NP7 5BB View on map
Today - 8:30am to 5:00pm See all opening hours

Call us on : 01873 857400

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What makes us different

3D CBCT scanner
Payment options available
Dedicated treatment coordinator
Wheelchair friendly
Nervous? Ask us about sedation
Free Wi-Fi
Free refreshments
Emergency appointments
Award winning practice
We're accepting dentist referrals
Over 40 years' local experience
Over 20 years' placing dental implants

Our treatments

Offering a wide range of treatments, we’re here to support patients at every stage of their journey to a better smile.

See treatment prices

How to pay for your treatment

You don’t need Bupa health insurance to use our dentists. Simply choose a Bupa dental practice and pay for the treatment you need, whenever you need it. We also offer other ways to help make caring for your teeth easier.

Meet the team at Smiles Better

With different skills and expertise, our team offers excellent routine care and specialist treatment.

Dentist

Nigel Jones

Dr Nigel Jones is our dental surgeon who places and restores dental implants.

Dentist

Ines De Jesus Ruco

Ines De Jesus Ruco’s main area of interest lies in orthodontic treatment, although she also provides general NHS dental treatments.

Dentist

Joao Rodriguez

Dr Joao Pedro Rodrigues is a dentist offering dental implants at Smile Better Abergavenney.

Meet the team

Our practice

Our experienced team delivers quality dental care in a friendly and welcoming environment and we’ll keep you informed about your treatment from the moment you arrive.

Hello there and thank you for your interest in dental implants. I'm Nigel Jones, I'm the implant dentist here at Smiles Better in Abergavenny and I've been placing implants for well over 20 years. I also teach on the Royal College of Surgeons Implant Diploma and through my experience, hopefully I can give you some ideas on why dental implants might be of interest to you, how they work and who you might be looking for in terms of providing you with teeth on your dental implants. So what what does an implant actually look like? Well, here's here's one in my hand and about the same size as a tooth root. And we place these carefully and gently into bone, doing as little damage as we can. We want at least a millimetre of internal bone around that implant to grip onto it and to hold it and to resist the forces of biting that come along. After about 3 months, the implant will have fused with your jawbone and we can then put a post that comes down through the gum and that's screwed in. And each system has its own torque setting and we torque that in to the right place once we have the post screwed into the implant or posts into implants. If we're doing lots of teeth, we can then get our crown that fits neatly and accurately onto the post. The crown is made to the shape and size and colour that matches the adjacent teeth and is only fitted once you're happy with it. It can come on and off and be changed until you are confident that it looks and feels like you want it to. So if you're looking for someone to provide you with implants, you are looking for someone who's been trained to do the surgery well. And you're looking for someone with the ability and the artistic flair to give you the teeth to go on top of those implants to look and sound like you. But most of all, you're looking for somebody with the ability to distil down your age, your medical condition, any social factors such as smoking and drinking that might impact on the implants, your bone quality, your bone quantity, what you're expecting in terms of your ability to eat and speak and to put all these things together into a plan that is going to work for you and give you what you want. Obviously, as a patient, you're going to have concerns about whether dental implants are right for you. One of the big concerns that people have when they come to see us is, is it going to be painful? Well, well, I can reassure you there. It's far less painful than having a tooth taken out. And for those people who are naturally anxious about dentistry, we offer them the chance to be sedated so that they can just snooze their way through the procedure. And that again, makes it easier. Is my implant going to work? Is it going to fuse with the jawbone? Well, in our hands, somewhere between 98 and 99% of implants do fuse. And it's so rare that one doesn't that we don't charge to replace it when it's there. You may at times have to have the teeth on the implants change because your own teeth will change shape or colour and you'll want to match them back in. But the implants themselves are likely to last for more than 20 years. And lastly, people worry about the expense. And yes, it is a costly procedure. Every implant is made specifically for you. The teeth that go on top are made by very skilful technicians. But we can give you some ideas on what it's likely to cost and give you firm quotations on what it will cost and come together with a plan that's right for you and hopefully suits your budget. So thank you very much for giving us some of your time in order to pursue your interest in dental implants. If there's anything I haven't covered or there's anything that you feel you'd like some more information about, please feel free to contact me here at Smiles Better in Abigail. Any if it's right for you, we would love to provide you with the treatment that you want to get your teeth and smile back as they once were.

So dental anxiety is a very common issue that a lot of people face. With regards to what we offer here at Smiles Better, all of our clinicians are very calm, a nice calm environment. We do also have a dentist that does offer sedation, Elliot, which can be a nice way to take the stress and strain out of dental treatment and make it more accessible if you are anxious about having any treatment provided.

Sedation in and of itself doesn't do anything. It's just to help relax people for other treatment that they might require. For some people, it's any dental treatment. For some people, it's specific things, maybe having a tooth taken out or the noise of the drill. It just feels too much to kind of cope with. Sedation helps people to relax in those sorts of treatments.

With a general surgery, often you're put to sleep and then when you wake up, it's a bit like how you don't remember what's happened to you in the fall asleep. With conscious sedation, which is what we're referring here, you are awake. You can respond to our questions and our instructions as we go. The way that it works in the brain is as well as calming you down, it punctures the way in which memories are formed. So, you just remember less of what's gone on.

I think any procedure that's lasting more than an hour, it's quite nice to have a bit of a sedative so that the time goes past more easily and you're more relaxed. There's a lot of evidence to show that relaxed patients suffer far less post-surgical pain than patients who are stressed. And that evidence goes back over 50 years. And so good anesthesia is important in the healing process. So controlling the amount of stress and inflammation for a patient is quite important.

And yes, probably 75% of the cases, perhaps even more, patients that we sedate in so they can have a little snooze through the whole process and not have to worry about what we're doing next.

We try to make the checkup appointments really, really relaxed. We know that lots of people aren't comfortable at the dentist and may have had sort of past bad experiences and we want to change that and basically always starts with a chat. We want to make you feel comfy. We want to get to know you.

The aim of a checkup isn't just the treatment that needs doing, but it's also prevention. Prevention is better than cure. So, as part of a checkup, you'll have a full check of all your teeth, gums, and any of the soft tissues in the mouth to check for any dental decay, gum disease, any lumps, bumps that would warrant further investigation.

As part of a checkup, you would also get any routine x-rays you may be requiring, as well as an intraoral scan of your teeth to give us a good 3D representation as part of your clinical records. If there's anything that we do notice that would require further skill set than what the general dentist is able to deal with, we have a few dentists working with us who do have a special interest in various subsections of dentistry which will allow you to have those more advanced treatments in a familiar and calm surrounding rather than having to go to an unfamiliar area you aren't aware of.

So benefits of coming regularly: we catch things when they're tiny. One of the main reasons that people are scared of the dentist is they've usually only appeared when they're in pain. So if a dental cavity is caught early, generally the treatment is a lot less invasive and a lot less costly. Early detection of gum disease can lead to better outcomes—being able to keep teeth, not getting any teeth becoming loose, requiring extraction, getting infected.

One of the benefits of being a patient with us and Smiles Better is even though we are part of the Bupa chain, we've retained the very much small-scale and family dental practice charm. Being one of our patients means you are effectively part of the family, part of the team

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How to find us

You'll find us on Baker Street in Abergavenny town centre. If you're driving, Frogmore Street car park is across the road from the practice, costing £2 for two hours. Free parking is available at Byefield Lane car park, apart from on Tuesdays, when parking here costs £6.20. If you’re travelling by bus, there are several local buses that run into the town centre. To support our commitment to sustainability, please consider walking or using public transport for your appointment if possible.

Smiles Better
Opening hours*


Monday	8:30am - 7:00pm
Tuesday	8:30am - 7:00pm
Wednesday	8:30am - 6:00pm
Thursday	8:30am - 5:30pm
Friday	8:30am - 5:00pm
Saturday	Closed
Sunday	Closed

Please note we are closed 12.45 to 1:50 Mondays and Wednesdays

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^‡Finance applicant must be aged 18 or over, a UK resident, have a UK bank account and be in permanent employment. All loans are subject to eligibility, status, affordability and a credit check. T&Cs apply. Finance is available on private dental treatments only.

The minimum spend for finance is £250 and the maximum is £50,000. 0% APR representative is available on repayment terms of up to 36 months subject to the amount of credit. Finance taken at repayment terms of 48 or 60 months is subject to 7.9% APR representative.

Bupa Dental Care is a trading name of Oasis Dental Care Limited, Vantage Office Park, Bristol, BS16 1GW, whose company registered number is 00478127. Oasis Dental Care Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority FCA registration number 710559. Oasis Dental Care Limited is a credit broker and not a lender.

Finance is provided by Novuna Personal Finance, a trading style of Mitsubishi HC Capital UK PLC, authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Financial Services Register no. 704348. Registered Office: Novuna House, Thorpe Road, Staines-upon-Thames, Surrey, TW18 3HP. Registered in Cardiff under company no. 1630491. The register can be accessed through www.fca.org.uk.

^‖Bupa Insurance:

You need to let the dentist know that you have Bupa dental insurance and provide your membership number prior to your appointment to benefit from this offer. 10% or 20% discounts are available depending on the practice and the dentist you are seeing. To find the selected Bupa owned and approved network dental practices where this offer is available visit finder.bupa.co.uk and search the Bupa Dental Insurance Network. Discount excludes laboratory fees and specialist treatment and cannot be used against NHS and Bupa Dental Essentials services. Discount cannot be used in conjunction with any other discount.

Bupa Dental Insurance is provided by Bupa Insurance Limited. Registered in England and Wales with registration number 3956433. Bupa Insurance limited is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority.

Arranged and administered by Bupa Insurance Services Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Registered in England and Wales with registration number 3829851. Registered office: 1 Angel Court, London, EC2R 7HJ.

All UK Bupa Dental practices accept Visa, Master Card, and American Express cards.

^†Bupa Smile Plan:

Terms and conditions apply. Applicants must be 18 or over. Payments are collected by monthly Direct Debit.

^*Equivalent appointment prices of included treatments (check-up & hygiene appointments) are an average of 10% less than when booked as a standalone appointment. (77% of 332 participating practices.)

^{^} We may record or monitor our calls.

Bupa Dental Care is a trading name of Oasis Dental Care Limited. Registered in England and Wales No: 00478127. Registered office: Bupa Dental Care, Vantage Office Park, Old Gloucester Road, Hambrook, Bristol, United Kingdom BS16 1GW.

Oasis Dental Care Limited has a number of trading names including Bupa Dental Care. Please see the list of our different trading names.

Smiles Better

What makes us different

Our treatments

How to pay for your treatment

Meet the team at Smiles Better