Dental Disillusionment

[Mercury]

I have been in the dentist chair since my teeth came in as a small child. For some reason, I have been cursed with terrible enamel and teeth that just do not want to cooperate. Even with years of brushing twice daily, flossing twice daily and the use of fluoride and mouth rinses, my teeth continue to suffer from decay. I'm thankful that I don't suffer from any other serious health issues and I don't even have common allergies ... but these teeth suck!

So I have had one tooth that has been hurting lately so I schedule an appointment to go in and most likely have it pulled. (I have already had all four wisdom teeth pulled along with all four of the back molars) I'm pretty much at peace with the fact that I can't save these teeth as I simply can't afford to. So I go in to the dentist and they want to do a full exam and do full X-rays of the mouth ... okay I understand and I am fine with that as this is a new dentist and I want them to know what is going on with all my teeth. The exam shows that four teeth will need root canals and crowns (that is a little over $5000.00 there alone) and this includes the tooth that is having issues. As a good dentist, she wishes to save the teeth and get the decay under control. Now, this full exam is $233.00 out-of-pocket since I am recently unemployed and uninsured. Before they do any action on the tooth that is painful, they want to do a "Full Mouth Debridement" which is a deep cleaning with a power washer type of tool. This costs $200.00. An extraction would be around $350.00. I'm hoping I will be able to talk them into just doing the extraction without doing the deep cleaning as I have pretty much decided to surrender my teeth ... but it is difficult to explain that to a dentist as this is something they simply do not wish to hear. The dentist already gave me a good speech about teeth being a worthwhile investment ... however ... when you simply can't borrow money and there is no way to get financing to pay for such treatment, the options become quite limited.

Had to rant about this as it is early in the morning (woke up because of tooth pain) and didn't know what else to do hehe.

Anyone else with a frustrating dental past?

 

[darkcgi]

How many times has the dentist told you you your teeth are bad cause you dont take good care of them
and you brush and floss like crazy and nothing works
I've been there


I'm sure there are many things that effect the teeth
but I'm one of those that have chemical and nerve disfunctions and the over flow of chemicals have ruined my teeth
I mention it to the dentist and he acts like I'm full of crap
My doctor tells me Its because of my chemical imbalance
These dentist's need to wake up

Got all of my replaced
Expensive but I no longer have pains and I'm no longer poisoning my body with decaying teeth
the decaying teeth flood your body with bacteria that can lead to organ damage including but not limited to heart failure

 

[Mercury]

How many times has the dentist told you you your teeth are bad cause you dont take good care of them
and you brush and floss like crazy and nothing works
I've been there

YES! It is seriously frustrating! How did you replace them? With implants?

 

[darkcgi]

yes each one screwed into my jaw bone
it was very time consuming but I dont feel much pain as most people
do
due the my nerve disorders
better less nerve pain I guess then too much lol
its weird
but its real

 

[Mercury]

Okay yeah, I have seen those implants. They look awesome! I was asking the dentist about them yesterday and she was saying they are $3500.00 each :eek

There is no way I could swing that, unfortunately. I probably will have to go with dentures :yuk

 

[darkcgi]

I suffered with it for about 15 years before I could afford to buy the replacements
I dont smile much
people always say the can see me smile by looking at my eyes
lol

 

[Weebs]

Out of pocket sux.. Just got one now that I am having root canaled Saturday.. Bastids got ya by the Molars.

 

[darkcgi]

800 a tooth
after getting rid of the molars
and 2000 for the extras

 

[darkcgi]

they told me they would out last me
I laughed because of lack of trust in people
and he said that unless I get cremated my son could dig up my bones and bring these in his shop and replace his teeth with them

 

[rback33]

Wow. I am just the opposite and the timing of this thread is eerie.. I had not been to the dentist in probably 15 years when I went last week. Today I got my first filling ever. I have been blessed no doubt.

 

[darkcgi]

by best friend growing up
never brushed his teeth or went to the dentist or drinks water
has perfect teeth
he also has chemical imbalance but its all upper on him
he is full speed up mainia 24/7

 

[Mercury]

Wow. I am just the opposite and the timing of this thread is eerie.. I had not been to the dentist in probably 15 years when I went last week. Today I got my first filling ever. I have been blessed no doubt.

:banned5:

LOL. I envy your teeth. I have a cousin who NEVER took care of his teeth like one is "supposed" and he only has had one or two cavities in his life. Makes me sick ....

 

[rback33]

Now don't get me wrong.. I worked reasonably hard to keep them nice. I brush my teeth pretty dang good at LEAST once a day and often times 2 or 3... I just have not had insurance and not really had a reason to go all these years.. once my company added dental I headed right in though!

 

[Mercury]

Now don't get me wrong.. I worked reasonably hard to keep them nice. I brush my teeth pretty dang good at LEAST once a day and often times 2 or 3... I just have not had insurance and not really had a reason to go all these years.. once my company added dental I headed right in though!

That's good then. I think that is probably true for most people that it does take a good amount of work to keep teeth healthy.

 

[Natasha]

That sucks...and I totally feel ya. I clench my jaws in my sleep and it causes tiny fractures in my teeth which then allow decay to get in, causing cavities. As a result, I've put endless amounts of money into dental work. Right now I don't have any work that needs to be done (*knock on wood*). I've easily put $10,000 out of pocket for my teeth, though, b/c I absolutely REFUSE to have busted teeth. :24:

 

[HK]

If you've been in and out of the dentist for years now, I'm surprised they didn't catch the decay in those teeth before it became serious enough for root canal. You don't just wake up with that level of damage, it has to develop.


I used to work for a dental clinic that included an implants specialist on the team, and he was easily the best paid there (in a room full of private dentists, who aren't exactly minimum wage earners). I don't know conversions off the top of my head, but for one implant he was usually talking £2000.


If you do ever get the option though, you don't have to be thinking a full mouth of implants. One of the options we had a lot of people go for was to have say a couple of implants fitted, and then fill the rest of the gaps with a bridge. Obviously a bridge is less secure and will need replacing sooner, but on the other hand they're normally vastly cheaper.

 

[Mercury]

If you've been in and out of the dentist for years now, I'm surprised they didn't catch the decay in those teeth before it became serious enough for root canal. You don't just wake up with that level of damage, it has to develop.

I did forget to mention that the last time I was at the dentist was about two years ago where I had a molar extracted and was informed of the amount of damage that was going on. Even with insurance I was unable to get all the work done and so I just ignored what needed to be done and, of course, things continued to get worse. It sucks since my front teeth, both top and bottom, all the way to the canines are in pretty good shape ... it's all the teeth after them.

One of my favorite sayings ... "If I knew then what I know now" ... I would have been way more proactive in finding ways to take even better care of my teeth. Implants would be nice to replace these back teeth but I doubt I would be able to get them any time in the near future.

 

[darkcgi]

the problem with parents these years.....
is that they don't explain as much to the children because they think that the child is not intelligent enough to understand what they say
but even if they dont understand it they may get the just of the key words you have used.

they need to take the time to play with their children but talke alot and dont talk baby talk, talk excatly how words are to be spoken.

my could have explained to me about my teeth when I was a kid but they just said I needed to brush them and kinda showed me how to do it
they knew the words but didn't express the info, they should have told us but its not their fault because they didnt know to do it

 

[Mercury]

That is very true! Something that I have learned with my two little ones. They understand more than I realize.

 

[Mercury]

Ugh! So .... I go back to the dentist yesterday and inform them that I am not interested in doing the debridement cleaning as I can't really afford to do that and the extraction but they tell me they will not do the extraction unless they do the debridement. They inform me this is due to the bacteria and their fear that it would infect the extraction site. I've had teeth pulled in the past without going through this cleaning first without issue so I am a bit ticked at hearing this, however, I understand where they are coming from and appreciate their concern. So, grudgingly, I agree to have the debridement done as they said they would do that then extract the tooth after they were finished. (It also helped that they threatened to charge me $175.00 if I didn't go ahead with it since I didn't cancel the appointment 48 hours before hand.) So after the debridement was finished the dentist came in to do a test as to which tooth it is that is bothering me. When I came in a couple days ago, I pointed out which tooth it was that was the culprit, but, okay ... let's do the tapping and cold tests again. As a side note, I took a pain killer before I went in to get a head start on fighting the pain from the extraction. So she begins tapping and applying cold to the three teeth that are on the lower-left side of my mouth. All three have issues and will have to be extracted at some point but the one that was giving me troubles, didn't react to the cold test right at first but it did respond from the tapping. The other two teeth also responded to the cold test and tapping. She leans back and says, "Well, we have a problem. All three of your teeth are reacting." I respond with, "Yeah, I am not surprised being that they are in such poor shape but it is this tooth that is the culprit as I have noticed that it specifically what is causing the pain in the past few weeks and it is the one I pointed out to you two days ago." She responds with, "You said it was this other tooth when you came in and I can't extract a tooth unless we know for certain which one it is as if we pull the wrong tooth, you will still be in pain." Okay ... now I am starting to get annoyed a bit. "No, I know it is this tooth for certain. I am giving you full permission to go ahead and extract this tooth right now." She responds with, "But this isn't the tooth that you indicated before so I am not going to pull any today. Let's get you scheduled to come back on Tuesday to do another test and don't take any pain killers before you come in so we can make certain."

I understand where she was coming from and I do appreciate her concern for doing a good job .... BUT ... I KNOW which tooth it is and I DID inform her which one it was the moment I first talked to her when I came in a few days ago. So, now that I have blown $233.00 on the exam ... $200.00 on the debridement ... I still have a tooth that is causing me pain. Obviously I am going to have to go somewhere else as this Dentist is forgetting an important aspect to health care ... actually listening to the patient. If I had a great paying career going along with amazing dental insurance, this would be a great place to go to. I already found another dentist that says they will just pull the damn tooth.

Oh well ... live and learn ...