Chetna Chadha Baveja, DDS

It’s been a few years since my experience with Dr. Baveja — full disclosure. I saw that quite a few people have had similar experiences and that so many 5-​star reviewers have suspiciously only ever reviewed this business, so I decided to write up mine. I was a client of Dr. Marwan Atrouni, who sold his business to Dr. Baveja. My experience with this office up until then had been remarkable and gentle — something that is necessary for a person with dental phobia like mine! When I went in for my first appointment after the change-​over I was told that I was in need of Invisalign. Uhh… I had *SEVEN* years of orthodontia as a teen and have maintained that work with retainers over the years. That was a red flag for me that told me it was time to find a new dentist. There was something about Dr. Baveja’s presence that had me a little on edge to begin with, so the blatant oversell was enough to send me packing. I need a dentist I can trust.
I should note that my hygenist would also overshare with me when I came in for cleanings. I was a captive audience since I couldn’t speak back or leave the room… and she would tell me very unprofessional details of her private life in a completely one-​sided conversation (e.g. her excessive drinking habits, who she slept with, etc.). I idon’t know whether she still works at this office, but there’s my experience, for what it’s worth.

Looks like she’s selling the practice, and hopefully to someone who is more competent. Unfortunately for me, the crown that she placed 2.5 years ago broke (they should last 5 years) and my current dentist stated that she chose the wrong material and didn’t place it on the tooth securely that he wasn’t surprised that it broke. Her office is making me come in to see the new dentist, even though she dismissed me from her practice (for nothing I had done). I’m hoping to be refunded for her mistake and move on to have my current dentist take care of my tooth.

OMG! I wanted to write a warning review long ago but because Dr Baveja’s reviews were mostly 4 and 5 stars, I thought my experience was an anomaly and gave her a pass. I randomly come across her page today and hallelujah (!!) she finally isn’t getting away with it. I scrolled through her reviews and the vast majority of her 5 stars are iffy accounts so I suspect many of them are fakes.
tl;dr version: She wants your money more than anything else. She (and her assistants) are the worst skilled dental professionals I have experienced. She will tell you to do unnecessary procedures that are painful and expensive. FIND ANOTHER DENTIST!
I had the worst dental experience (hopefully of my life) with this office. I came in with what was supposed to be a routine procedure — cavity/​replacing fillings — and ended up going home with (1) one side of my face swelling to nearly double the size and a bruising shade of purple creeping halfway up from my mouth to my ear (a co-​worker said I looked like I got hit by a truck) AND (2) a migraine that lasted for over a week because the assistant she sent to shape my filling (which is something she probably should’ve done herself) did it incorrectly, setting my jaw out of alignment.
When I went to her office to show her what had happened, she takes a look inside my mouth and tells me there’s a lot of bruising; she thinks what happens is that she hit a blood vessel with the shot she used to put in the local anesthetic and now I’m basically bleeding into my face. Obviously this was a technical error on her part yet she never once apologized. Maybe she got trained not to say «I’m sorry» so she’s not admitting fault in case I sue her or something but wow… isn’t it basic human decency to say you’re sorry if you injure someone? Instead, she says this sort of thing is extremely rare and that I should buy a lottery ticket. What?! They give me a couple Advils, an ice pack and send me home.
Cut to the next week — one of the teeth I had work on is *super* sensitive (this has never happened to me after a filling) and I’ve been suffering *terrible* headaches everyday since the visit from both sides of my temples being extremely sore; no amount of medicine will make them go away. I’ve *never* experienced this and when I call to explain, despite this coincided exactly with visiting their office, I get told there’s no reason for the correlation and it’s a mystery. I go into the office, again. Dr. Chadha reshapes my filling so the bite isn’t off (I had told the woman who did the first shaping that it didn’t feel right and she basically told me she knew better and that I was too numb to make the call). Over the next day, the tooth sensitivity and more importantly, the temple aches and headaches start to go away. Obviously, the misaligned bite was causing both.
And bonus! When I went to her for a cleaning, she told me that because there’s there’s so much build-​up, I need to separate my cleaning into two parts. Meaning, she wanted me to get cleanings 4 times a year — double what is recommended — 2 times to be paid by my insurance, and 2 times to be paid out of pocket. I have NEVER had a dentist say this to me and moreover, EVERY dentist I get cleanings from tells me how I have excellent dental hygiene and very healthy gums.
When I finally decided I would NEVER go to Dr Baveja and requested that my records get sent over to another office, they didn’t bother to transfer them until I called THREE times. And there’s more awfulness! …my new dentist tells me that I have no cavities (there were at least 2 remaining she said I should get treated) and I suspect that the other «cavities» she worked on were totally unnecessary. That said, I LOVE and totally TRUST my new dentist and that has only re-​emphasized how awful Dr Baveja’s practice is.
ALL THAT TIME, PAIN AND EXPENSE FOR NO REASON! Horrible, horrible, unethical HORRIBLE office, dentist, everything! Stay away!

Been going to this practice for years and years.
Always have had great experience with them. They provided the (not fun to hear) truth on my current state and with some work by them, I got my teeth back up to snuff! Since then (a few years now) I have only had normal cleanings, which is great.
So I would highly recommend this group!

This dentist is a liar and a scammer.
1. Before moving to San Francisco, I was seeing a dentist every 6 months. My prior dentist has a great reputation. When I moved to San Francisco, I saw Chetna Chadha Baveja. She told me I needed to replace nearly every filling in my mouth. I was confused, and didn’t know if I should believe her or not, until…
2. My wife had her 6 mo. checkup. Chetna Chadha Baveja said she had 11 cavities. At this point, because of my experience with the above, I didn’t believe it. My wife got a second opinion. She only had 1 cavity. Can you believe that, to extract more money from you, they would put you through the misery of filling 11 cavities?!
3. I was just billed twice for the exact same service. Then dentist submitted a second claim to the insurance company with a different date of visit.
p. s. On my first visit, they tried to sell me $ 7,000 invisalign. The dentist I was seeing regularly never even recommended braces, and the dentist I switched to after this laughed when I told him she recommended invisalign. Be warned, this dentist will try to sell you things you don’t need.

Great Doctor and extremely supportive staff.
I have been visiting this location since last 3 years now. And the service is consistent and up to the mark.
Doctor: She did my 3 Cavity Fillings & 1 Crown. Procedures were extremely painless and technology she uses is high tech. One of my cavity filling she did was almost a possible root canal, she told me about it before hand. And that was well till 1.5 years, which was way beyond expectations.
Hygienist: Great work always, and takes care of cleaning as well as comfort.
Support staff: Very responsive and gives clear instructions & estimations.
I would highly recommend and 5 star to them! :)

I can’t tell you how nervous I was to find a new dentist after relocating to SF from NYC. I had an awful experience trying a new dentist in NYC before moving so I was extremely weary. I looked online, researched on Unilocal,asked friends for suggestions and finally deciding to make an appointment with Dr. Chadha who came to me from a coworker’s recommendation.
After my first appointment I was so relieved and happy to find that I love Dr. Chadha and her staff! The staff is extremely friendly, the office and instruments are clean and modern and they even offer you a choice of TV to watch while getting your dental work done. I was a new patient so Dr. Chadha thoroughly explained everything that they did and found during my appointment and provided me with information and recommendations for improving aspects of my cleaning regiment.
I would definitely recommend Dr. Chadha to everyone and am so grateful I found a dentist that I trust AND like!

I’m of two minds about Dr. Baveja. I think her staff and she do an exceptional job when it comes to cleanings. Though I did experience some of the similar issues that other reviewers mentioned about them pushing treatments that were not necessary. My childhood dentist gave me a second opinion that suggested I didn’t need all of what she suggested. If you’re just planning to do the bi-​annual cleaning, they’re fantastic. Anything more, I would stick with someone who doesn’t encourage extra treatments.

I never write reviews but my experience with them has left such a bad taste in my mouth I’m compelled to do so.
I only went to Dr. C because she took over the office when the previous dentist moved. She seemed ok, probably not as personable as the doc before, but it didn’t bother me.
I had a procedure done in Feb 2011, continued to go for check ups throughout the year and had my final check up/​cleaning in Jan 2012 as I moved out of state in Feb 2012. Fast forward 3.5 years and I get a call from a collection agency! noone likes calls from a collection agency! especially if you’ve actually taken care of your credit for all these years! anyway, speaking to them, calling the office to get information and calling my old insurance I gathered the following information and was pissed:
collection agency — you owe $ 202.47 on a procedure done in 2011
dr office — you owe $ 90.47 on a procedure done in 2011
insurance — cleaning was denied bc of frequency (one on 8÷19÷2010 and this one, 2÷1÷2011)
if you’re still reading, this is why I’m pissed.
1) The office has my phone number, this has NEVER changed. they even called me 6 months after my final appointmemt to schedule another cleaning and I told them that I’ve moved out of state and they stopped calling. this leads me to believe they have this noted SOMEWHERE bc appt reminder calls stopped but yet they NEVER told me I had a balance on my acct during the year I continued going back and afterwards
2) what’s up with the debt difference? there was no interest added or fee to the collection agency, why did they submit $ 112 more than what was owed? I had to call the office back and make them resubmit the correct amount, which of course was neither 202.47 or 90.47.
3) I know it’s not their responsibility to make sure my appts are 6 months out, but really? you can’t take that one extra step to ensure it’s paid by the insurance company? great customer service!
at the end of the day, they didn’t really make an effort to reach out to me, they tried to report the wrong amount of debt to collections (which if I didn’t question the debt, she would’ve made $ 112 off of me), and they just don’t take that extra step to ensure you’re covered. lesson learned, always research/​read reviews!

I would never recommend anyone here.
There are positives. The office is clean, staff is very friendly, technology is up to date and you get to watch TV while you are getting a cleaning. However, the negatives far beat out the positives.
I may just be naïve, but I want to believe what a doctor tell me. With Dr. Chadha, don’t do this. She pushes treatments that are not necessary. She told me I had 5 cavities, even though I had been to a different dentist 6 months earlier and they didnt find anything. Also, I was in no pain, and brush and floss etc. I later found out that she told my coworker that he had 12 cavities. He was smart enough to get a 2^nd opinion. His second opinion told him he had 2 cavities, but everything else looked great. Unfortunately, I decided to get treatment from Dr. Chadha. She ended up aggravating some nerves, and I was forced to get a root canal.
Dr. Chadha was an expensive mistake.

Dr. Chetna Chada’s office has all the components needed for a great dentist clinic: nice place, caring staff, and, of course, a knowledgable experienced dentist!

So a visit to the dentist’s office is rarely categorized as a pleasure trip, but if you get a really friendly staff, super nice facility, loads of TV to watch, and a doctor who is one of the most good humored and amiable persons you have met, it starts to rank up there with, if not a week in Hawaii, at least a nice day trip to Stinson beach.
Each of my visits to Dr Chetna Chadha has been a genuinely pleasant experience. I have always had good dental health and where others have tried to sell me on add on services (invisalign, teeth whitening) I have never been pushed by her or her staff to to go for anything more than needed.
Highly recommended!

I started seeing Dr. Chadha based on the reviews on here. I agree that the staff is very nice and it’s really helpful to see how much your insurance will pay for any service you get. I also liked the ability to watch TV or movies during my cleaning.
Now for the bad…
Like some other reviewers, I felt like they tried to push treatments on me including a deep cleaning. I let them refill one of my old cavities despite hearing other people’s horror stories that this sometimes results in a root canal. After the cavity was redone I was in constant pain for 2+ months until I finally had to get the (you guessed it) dreaded root canal. At least Dr. Chadha sent me to Dr. Ravi Koka for the root canal and I absolutely loved him. Frankly, the pain for over 2 months was way worse than the root canal itself.
So despite some skepticism about Dr. Chadha after this, I decided to return there. Their new appointment system is on ZocDoc so I set up an appointment online through that. The office changed my appointment to a date that didn’t work without telling me. When I then set up a new appointment on ZocDoc, apparently that date also didn’t work for Dr. Chadha’s office. So tell me what exactly is the point of this new system if the appointments on it are not actually available???
Dr. Chadha’s office was very nice in their emails to attempt to get me an appointment that actually works for my schedule. However, after several emails with them I told them I would just be getting a new dentist rather than a new appointment.

Dr. Chadha and her entire staff are so amazing that I plan to see her every 3 months for the rest of my life! I love this dentist office for many reasons. Dr. Chadha is the nicest, funniest, patient, most professional dentist I have ever known (and I have seen many). She takes her time with you and goes over all of your options and really goes above and beyond to make sure you are happy and comfortable. Her staff is an extension of herself: super sweet, respectful and on top of it! I also love the modern office, with new equipment & extreme cleanliness. I have sent friends here and everyone is extremely pleased! Highly recommend.

I found Dr. Chadha on Unilocal and so wanted to close that loop. I specifically wanted a dentist that has TVs you can watch while they do their thing — because I don’t really want to be mentally present for the procedure. Having said that, I’ve now had tons of fillings here and they all seem good. Dr. Chadha has also made herself available on v. short notice when I had a sudden toothache. Her staff are very pleasant and professional and you can schedule appointments online, as well as get text reminders.
Overall, I’m very satisfied and have referred Dr. Chadha’s office to friends and colleagues.

Dear San Francisco and Dr. Chadha,
If the review I wrote in 2011 wasn’t glowing enough–
FOUR YEARS LATER: Axe feels like Axe may keep his teeth into his late 70s at this rate. Each visit is well documented. Dr. Chada and her team of smart, competent, knowledgeable dental hygienists and assistants (now even more robust– having grown her staff– but having retained the same core team). Dr. Chadha has a watchlist for your MOUTH.
Axe doesn’t know anything about the mouth, other than he needs it to eat homemade Istrian Wedding Pillows or drink Willamette-​Valley Pinot to his heart’s content, and kiss his Eastern European Family (they do that you know– on the mouth– even your own grandma). Thus, for Axe to comment on the technical acumen of the staff other than to say his mouth– teeth, gums, tongue, his palates, his vestibules– everything– the whole wet mess– is taken care of by a really superior dentist and her truly excellent team is all he can say from the decks of the laity– where his mouth FEELS good– much better then it ever had– and he might even consider some of those flossing lessons he keeps getting over at 369 Pine.
Thank you Dr. Chadha– without you I could have some serious dental and health problems.
Kind regards,
Axe P.

I want to just warn everyone to be skeptical if you decide to go in — just because this is a doctor, it doesn’t mean you should believe everything they are telling you.
The fact that I was required to make 2 $eparate appointment$ (1 for cleaning, then 1 for exam) was weird to begin with.
The exam was really thorough, and I learned a lot, but as more time went on, I felt like they were trying to convince me that things were much worse than they actually are.
Then I was told that I’m a «beautiful girl» but that she really «feels for me» regarding my 1 tooth that isn’t perfectly straight along with the rest of my smile. (yikes! who’s gonna marry me now!?)
The cherry topper is that all this was quickly bundled up with 2 recommendations for invisalign treatment (~$ 5,000) along with a new retainer, that would barely be covered by my insurance plan.
I decided to cancel all my future appointments and go back to my childhood dentist, who I have never felt uneasy about.

I had been going to the same dentist for years… practically since I was a kid. I was pretty resistant to changing dentists until they began becoming inflexible with scheduling, etc.
Long story, I Unilocaled dentists in the Financial and Dr. Chada had the highest ratings. I was nervous but trusted the Unilocalers out there.
Needless to say, glad I did. Dr. Chada makes my old dentist seem like they were practicing medieval dentistry.
They fully assess your condition, create a treatment plan, and execute it while keeping the patient totally aware about what’s going on.
Also a shout out to Gisela and Daniela for going to bat with my insurance company on my behalf and being flexible if I’m running a few minutes late…
If you’re considering a new dentist, Dr. Chada gets my vote!

I love Dr. Chadha and her staff.
WHen I first went in I was a little worried because the whole place seemed a little «slick». I don’t know. It just seemed like too much to me. And maybe people want to look at dental equipment, but I didn’t.
But then I had a cleaning and several issues with my teeth fixed. Although it took a while, it was so worth it! I had 3 different procedures done over almost 2 years. I have never had an issue with any of the work.
You know how when you get something done to your teeth, it takes a few days or even weeks not to notice the difference. That never happens with Dr. Chadya. She does the work and it is like it never happened. Your mouth feels totally normal. Not weird lumps or bumps, just perfect.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not a fan of going to any dentist, but I am a HUGE fan of Dr. Chadya and her staff. 5 stars without a doubt. And my teeth look and feel so much better.
I highly recommend her.

I don’t understand how this office can have all 5 star reviews because I had a very different experience. I found the receptionists here to be very friendly and very helpful, which was refreshing and I liked. However, there were a number of things that I found odd or uncomfortable here.
First, they bring you into a room to get your medical history and ask you OUT LOUD in a room with no walls about your sensitive medical information. You don’t even get to write it down or anything– you have to tell it to them out loud.
Then I went in for a cleaning with the oral hygienist and it took – get this – one hour and fifteen minutes for a cleaning. I mean, I admire the thoroughness but some of us have jobs that we have to get back to and the lack of urgency was slightly annoying. Not only that, but the hygienist also decided it was appropriate to discuss sensitive medical information out loud even though the this room also had no walls. Inappropriate? Yes.
Finally, after the hygienist was done, she informed me I would not see the doctor that day but would have to come back and «that’s how they do things here.» I have never in my life had that happen in a dental office. Wait, you just took over an hour cleaning my teeth and now i have to come BACK to even get an exam? In 2 weeks? They should have at least told me that over the phone when I made my first appointment.
I came back two weeks later to see the dentist herself, who was also very thorough. One thing I did not like about the whole experience was the continuous stream of dental mumbo-​jumbo she was saying over my head to the assistant to write down, without explaining anything to me. She proceeded to tell me I had some cavities to be filled (okay), but did so in an unclear way that made me unsure of how many she was talking about, how necessary they were, or what it was going to cost. I did not appreciate how little explanation I received, even after asking for clarification. You should not be told you need separate expensive procedures done without a full explanation.
Finally, my overall impression here was of being judged. I believe this dentist and her hygienists are smart and know what they are doing, but they have to understand that they are working with human beings here. It is upsetting for someone to hear they need filings or other dental care, and for them to be so condescending is just the icing on the cake.
I also think they are overly inclusive in telling you which services you supposedly need. While most dentists understand limitations of time, money, and tolerance for having other people’s hands in your mouth, these people don’t seem to get that. You should be telling patients what they ABSOLUTELY need and what they don’t necessarily need but you’d recommend and let them make an informed decision about dental services. I went to another dentist for a second opinion and was told that most of the things this dentist said I HAD to do were either not necessary or easily delayed to see if the things would resolve themselves.
All in all, an okay dental office but not one I’ll be returning to.