Gritting teeth over dentistry costs
I am of an age when I am forced to consult a dentist.
Yes a pre-fluoride, baby bulge babe I need my teeth fixed. Fillings, like buses, seem to take an age to materialise and suddenly appear all at once.
I had two to see to this week. My NHS dentist has retired since my last consultation – can I find another? Not a chance. So what do I do?
I go to the nearest dental entity I can find, and satisfactory it is – until I pay the bill: £250 for two fillings! AND he informs me I need two more doing – indeed he’s done much more.
My new dentist, lovely man that he is, is a man with a plan. To be truthful, a plan of straightening fillings, strengthening, and, forget five gold rings, FOUR gold caps.
Total price not unadjacent to more than several thousand pounds. I’m going for a total head transplant – cheaper.
But seriously, “free at the point of delivery’, what has happened to NHS dentistry? Has this vital division of our beloved NHS been allow very privately to go private?
Have you ever met a poor dentist? Is my dental experience a London affair? Is there a thriving NHS practice in Barrow-in Furness? Do pigs fly? Is the Pope a Catholic? Bring me my NHS dentist and my arrows of desire! My bow of burnished gold is very soon going to be my very expensively secured row of gold caps.
You think the ties are bright? Wait till you see the teeth!
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There are 19 comments on this post
NHS dentist’s don’t exist anywhere near me. Last one I found wouldn’t treat me anyway. Asthmatic, tendency to bleed..
Funny, happy to do the work privately though….Go figure.
Goodness, Jon, you have done well to be with NHS dentistry this long!
Here in the sticks (West Yorkshire) we long ago – slight hyperbole – two or three years, were gently/insidiously steered towards private care for our pearly notso whites.
I too am plucking up both courage and finances to see about a massive cavity (not my brain!) that resulted from crunching raw carrot! Healthier diet, they call it!
I have had no trouble registering with NHS dentists in Birmingham, Bath and London (on my very own street corner) over the last few years – maybe because I don’t leave it till it’s an emergency?
But I’ve never had to have anything serious done, though, and my friend is about to go private to sort out a dodgy filling done by an NHS doctor that lead her to have a black front tooth and an abcess in the roof of her mouth….
Oh, and also, my latest dentist wondered why I was there (for an overdue yearly check up) and made me feel like I was being over the top to have it – not exactly inspiring.
Don’t get a head transplant, we like your head!
Spot on, Jon. The dental ‘profession’ has been allowed to plunder the pockets of the dentally desperate simply because the Government did not have the balls to stand up to them and point out who pays the bills. Same with the GPs and surgeons – nothing has changed since the NHS was fomed in 1948, when it was considered expeditious to cross their palms with gold simply to pay the blackmail and get them on board. “Free at the point of delivery” – don’t make me laugh – and I can’t even afford a decent smile !
I agree tht GP’s are also a problem Mudplugger. I know for a fact that some of them do as little work as possible and take as much out of the Practice as they possibly can. The Practice Manger and patients (I’ve mates falling into both categories) are literally tearing their hear out because of the GP’s idleness…
But I do have to be fair and say that it is not all GP’s. There is another GP at the same practice from “the Old School” who is exemplary, but he’s approaching retirement. It’s the youngsters who grew up in Maggie’s Britain and were trained by New Labour who have the wrong attitudes to the job and their patients…
I think you’ll find that a lot of Bankers could be similarly pigeonholed, grew-up under Maggie and trained by New Labour…
Glad you’ve blogged about Dentistry again Jon. Its a real problem in the real world that politicians don’t seem to care about.
I still haven’t got my tooth fixed. There are lots of NHS Dentists listed locally, but none of them are accepting new patients. Its ludicrous as they obviously have the time to treat me privately, they just don’t want to treat any patients on the NHS. It’s all down to greed again. Dentists obviously went to the same schools as the Bankers and our MP’s…
I wonder how many NHS patients some Dentists are actually treating. I guess they only need one to be classed as an NHS Dentist.
The other issue is if NHS Dentistry Services are under pressure, shouldn’t UK citizens be prioritised over all the Health Tourists, Asylum Seekers and so-on…
I’m rather hoping that Mother Nature has a way of dealing with bad teeth and that it’ll loosen up naturally so I can remove it myself, without any human intervention. If it develops into an infection and then blood poisoning, so be it: it will solve a lot of other problems….
BTW I blogged about “the UKs Victorian Dental Services” myself, only last week, explaining problems I’ve had over years.
No it’s not a London thing. About five years ago my dentist opted out of NHS and for lack of alternative, I had to take out an insurance scheme to keep with him. It was £15 a month – not too bad – but now it’s up to £30 and with retirement approaching I’m likely to end up with no cover at all.
Another Blair promise reneged on. Look out Europe – you have nothing to lose but your teeth
I’m about the same age as you Jon and I despair of dentistry. I smashed my front teeth when I was 11 and my life has been blighted by dentists since: incompetence, avarice, sadism… I try not to go anywhere near them!
I thought you were sucking a Tune last night. You were neither bending forward to sympathise with any one, or leaning back in your chair to attack. Oh yes, we watch the body language and general behaviourism you know, you don’t escape that scrutiny.
My ex husbands’ wife is a dentist and at one time , I used emotional blackmail to get it free,… she charges now….., but I can complain.if needs be…..The gold caps I had worn were given by one dentist friend and were taken off by her, probably part of the gold reserves now.
The problem with dentistry began with our generation though Jon. I used to go every six months to a dentist throughout childhood and by enlarge that dentist would find something to drill each and every time I went; they were on piece work. They actually did create a lot of damage.
It’s £60P/H for missed appointments.
There are NHS dentists available throughout London. A good starting point for finding one is to visit http://www.nhs.uk/ServiceDirectories. Select ‘dentists’ and type in the relevant postcode. Some may have closed lists so they won’t take on new patients. If you have difficulties you can contact your local Primary Care Trust (PCT), who should be able to find a suitable practice that will admit you. I suspect finding a dentist is the only occasion people will have need to contact their PCT.
By the way Jon, my aunt’s a dentist, and she says if your dentist recommends gold fillings, find a new dentist. Gold’s easier for them to work with, but worse for your mouth – both in terms of cosmetics and longevity..
But more to the point – yes, the lack of dentistry in London is a crime.
You are lucky you are not in ROI – as costs here are it appears even worse – as many go North to to get dentsistry done – far cheaper in NI apparently – some even go to Eastern European countries – as it is cheaper to pay hotels , flights etc – and apparently very good work – eg a frind went to Lithuania – and very satisfied with work .
We were all watching at 7pm to get a flash of your new gnashers. Trouble with the news tonight it was too sad and serious, so we couldn’t get a smile out of you.
Still you will have to relearn how to say your s’s and t’s again with all that extra weight in the old cavity.
You are a lucky guy , we all love you and that’s what keeps the show going., but then you know that and court it admirably.
if you need a tooth removing jon, i have a good pair of pliars
you are so right…dentistry, along with eye glasses…its bloody sad considering people fought long and hard for a civilised approach to health
In Leeds it’s been a nightmare to find a new dentist but fortunately there was one nhs dentist available to suit my filling needs. Nevertheless the fact that there was a search was a little disappointing but not wholly surprising. At one point I believe local news said muh about scarboroughs scarcity of the
I have had this problem for the past twelve years ever since I moved to darkest Gloucestershire. There is an emergency NHS dental hotline to ring but they only offer one treatment and since then I have had to go privately. I persuaded my dentist to remove my remaining teeth so now have a denture and no more bills I can ill afford! The final solution to a lifetime of drill and fill NHS dentistry.
I think the lack of NHS dentistry is a scandal that no one wants to confront. It’s close to impossible to find a NHS dentist in my area; as a result a lot of my friends have bad oral health. If there was a severe shortage of GP surgerys to the extent that people couldn’t get treatment, as there is with dentists, there would be national uproar.
I have a NHS dentist and very good he is too. now i just got to get my Winter gritting sorted so I can actually get there