Dentist visit
 

I went to the dentist today to have a couple of "minor" fillings done. The whole process was (almost) completely relaxing apart from the drilling. I was highly impressed with the patient care and the actual photographs taken of the teeth to see the beginning, middle and end were very interesting and much easier for the untrained x-ray reader like me to understand what they were actually doing.

The damage - $888!!

Luckily my work health plan covers just about all of this but I almost fell over, I though she said $8.88 to start with thinking she had put the claim through my insurance already. And this was with the new dentist I have not the old one...

So a snap shot of potential minor work costs for you if heading to the Calgary area.

So keep brushing, flossing and avoid sweetened & fizzy drinks:)

Helen

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I had root canal done last week:thumbdown: for $900:eek:
Next time I go I'm going to ask the dentist to put a bigger mask on while he's robbing me:rofl:

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all that fancy stuff and a root canal for 60 quid in the west midlands recently!

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I had a check up and 2 fillings for £45 in Dover a few months ago.

I had a shock with my first dental check up in 1997 in Calgary. Bill was $750 for check up and chipped tooth repair- no medical insurance then.

I happy to keep the NHS funded with my taxes.

hudd

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I'd be cheaper flying back to the UK for treatment.........and stock up on wine gums and sports mixture while i'm at it:eek:

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For two fillings??

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Nah. Go to Mexico and have a dental holiday. A root canal is $350. A crown $180. The savings pay for the trip and the work is top notch.

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Luckily my dental plan is still in effect from my old job:thumbup: but i do like the sound of a dental holiday:thumbsup:

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Hi

I new a Scottish family in Calgary would get their major dental work done when they went back to Scotland on holiday.

hudd

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don't you ever wonder why brits take alot of bad teeth jokes???
cos your dentist are shite thats why!! I paid for private dentist in UK and it was amazing how a cleaning went from a 10 minute job to a proper 45 mins job...cleanings are not done in 10 mns...!!!
We also have white fillings here, not in UK unless you pay for them....and to be honest dentists in UK are tired of making nothing for their work that's why so many are going private.

You complain about the price of dentist in Canada but face facts, they do better work here!!

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I don't think British dentists are inherently shite any more than Canadian ones are all wonderful. I had a private dentist in the UK and had white fillings done at the front. Cleaning took 30 mins the same as here, though I do think the hygenists have a wider scope of practise here and some of the work they do is done by the dentist in England. My Canadian dentist hasn't sneered at my dental work either. Though some Canadians have volunteered the information that a) my teeth aren't bad for a Brit, and b) I could pay to get my yellow British teeth whitened. This last was said by a stranger.

I've seen more people in their 40s and 50s here with dentures here than I ever saw when I was in the UK. I have to ask people to remove their dentures for some x-rays so that's how I know this. Plenty of others have gaping great holes and rotten teeth. I've seen people with teeth worn down to stubs. Never saw that in the UK.

NHS dentistry may have it's faults but at least pretty much everyone had access to a dentist. 10 minutes cleaning is better than none.

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That's just it in some areas they don't, have you not seen the news when a new dentist comes to an area, the line up is a mile long....and why not do the job right the first time.

I always thought the Dentistry should be means tested....my boss was loaded but still used NHS dentist, making it impossible for someone who couldn't afford much to get in....he was also a stingy old fart until he wanted new toy!!!

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Well exactly. I know there might be difficulties with getting an NHS Dentist these days but I kept regular dentist appointments until I moved to Canada when I found that due to a lack of benefits in my first jobs here I couldn't really afford to go to the Dentist. It's only just recently that I've started going again.

I see plenty of people here with bad teeth who presumably are unable to afford the dentist or don't have the appropriate benefits.

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I am sorry, but why do people need to have their teeth cleaned by the hygienist - can you not clean and maintain them yourself??

I have never had to have mine cleaned or scaled and polished!

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Even with these two fillings that brings the total number of fillings in my mouth to 4. I am 33, have no wisdom teeth (might explain a few things) and never needed any other treatment. Apparently that puts me in the top percentile for overall oral health and the dentists here are amazed since I come from the UK.

I used to receive excellent and reasonable dental care (private) in the UK. The last filling I had done cost 60GBP more than 6 years ago, my dentist used to clean my teeth himself, no dental hygenist and he used ultra sonic equipment and charges 35GBP for clean, check-up & polish. The time in cleaning here is taken up by the laborious manual scraper, but insurance companies pay it so they charge for it. I think a 10 minute "unit" costs about $67. It's more expensive than the actual consultation with the dentist!

Discussing with my new dentist yesterday he said the people with the best teeth are usually from China and other far eastern countries, not due to their dental treatment (which has been pretty much non-existent until very recently) but to their diet being low in refined sugar. On the flip side of that they usually have terrible gum disease because of no routine brushing & flossing. The average Canadian might look like their teeth are great but the amount of work they have had done is insane and it all boils down to diet, well fizzy drinks. That and popcorn apparently!

Helen

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I paid 600 euros for root canal in Italy, Plus the git answered his mobile whilst still drilling my tooth:ohmy:

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My wife is a dentist so I dont care :rofl:

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A dentist in Canada?

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Not in Canada yet, but she'll have to get herself registered once we move over. I know she'll have to pass exams etc for that purpose. Thats whats she tells me

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Rather more than that. Search on biiiiink's old posts, her husband is a dentist. Getting him reformatted for Canada involved them having to live in Winnipeg.

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Maybe you should, then you can find out the difference.


I suppose it depends a lot on your teeth too. If you have perfectly arranged teeth and a brush/ floss reaches all the corners you might get away with it.

Mine are not exactly straight inplaces, and there are spots where plaque / tartar builds up that escape the attention of both brush and floss. Its like night and day before and after the hygenist, who of course is also on the look out for other problems too. I think of it as an insurance policy against far more expensive problems years down the line.

Dentistry here is certainly better than I experienced in the UK, but thank God for benefits to pay for it!

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Wow, i think you have been ripped off with that. My last visit to the dentist in Vancouver set me back ~$300 if i recall correctly for 2 fillings and all the trimmings that come with it.

.

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Really?

My dentist is from Casablanca and trained in France. She only had to do one exam when she came to Canada. We discussed this a few weeks ago.

Bestest dentist I ever had. And the prettiest.

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Thanks dbd. I'll get her to have a look at that. I hope its not extremely tough to work in Canada as a dentist for new immigrants

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It can't be. As my previous post indicates, my current dentist is an immigrant. The one before her is from Croatia.

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Not sure if I was ripped off or if Calgary dentists generally rip people off. I guess it is the naivety in me thinking they all charge the same but I don't have much experience with actual "work" from dentists so have very little to compare with. My husband had fillings redone and they were much cheaper, more like $100-$150 each, but that might be a cheaper as less work involved? He also said he was in a rush so no need to bother with anasthetic:eek: Apparently that knocked 30 minutes off the appointment time!

I really do think they treat the plan you have rather than the patient, but as I said in my first post the palative care was fantastic and I would rather see this dentist whom I actually like and is professional. The first one I had spent half the time in the room discussing his new car with the hygenist!!

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I'm not claiming to be an authority but my memory of the story is:

- qualifications to be converted by taking a course (one year, two? long enough that they bought a house near the school anyway)

- course covered only stuff he already knew

- some issue about residency being required and hardly any places being available making it difficult to get in

Maybe it was problematic that his qualification was from the UK, perhaps he could have gone to France, requalified there and challenged the Canadian exam. Perhaps the rules have changed. Perhaps it's different in Quebec.

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On here? Could you send me the link to that post please? Dont mean to hijack this thread but we have just started our research on how can my wife get registered in Canada so we'll appreciate any sort of help or would like to hear from people who have done it

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I'm guessing that it's a Quebec thing. Provincial law here is similar to the Napoleonic Code used in France. Maybe the similarities extend?

Either way, I asked her a very direct question and got a very direct answer.

"mmmmm mmmm gag mmmm gag mmmmm"

"I just had to sit one exam".

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Not on here, no. It was a discussion with my dentist.

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Dunno but should clarify that I meant clinical residency, not living-in-Canada residency.

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Exactly. I had gingivites during both my pregnancies and my UK dentist did nothing to help or control and damage. Looking back I feel mighty pissed because that's one reason why pregnant ladies are given free dental care during and 1 year after pregnancy - gingivites is common during that time and causes a lot of damage.

Hence, I have had trouble with my gums ever since and only since moving to Canada has it improved vastly. My kids, who have never had a filling between them, see the hygenist twice a year to as it is considered preventative.

Costs approximately $23 for checkup and hygenist cleaning with insurance. I had an old large amalgam filling replaced last week for a new white one at the cost of $31. My dentist uses gum numbing gel prior to freezing and I never felt the needle AT ALL :D

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Was he a dentist or a dental surgeon perhaps?...the surgery aspect in the UK requires long additional training and would run into the same residency requirement issues here that UK doctors can face...

Might be the same for dentistry, you are right though that it was a bunch of hassle for biiinks husband for whatever reason.

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OK :D

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hi i am in airdrie as well yes i need 3 crowns to be done at $1200 each was waiting for wife to get her benifit now i have lost my job so no benifits at all
peter

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Hmm, where to start. Private dentis vs NHs dentis.
I was registered with a private dentist (although she carried out NHS treatments one day a week) I went in for a wisdonm tooth extractio, just as she is about to start, she say, we usually refer people to the hospital for wisdom teeth, then proceeded to yank away in my mouth. Needless to say, she sheared away half the tooth, couldn't get the rest out, and had to do referral to hospital.
I was left in apin for a LONG time.
Went to hospital for NHs to finish what she started, cound not have been better, no pain, in and out within 20 mins. I'd pick NHS over that private lady any day!
Yet to experience canadian option on dentistry, but sounds expensive, so i'll just have to take good care of them!!

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Did your employer not give you the option to keep paying for your benefits for a few months once they let you go....it seems standard practice around here, at least in my experience.

$1200 each seems steep, but its been a while since I had root canal/ crowns done.

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Don't kid yourself private in UK is expensive as well.
1 filling and a proper cleaning £250...so there is a difference between the way they work on NHS patients opposed to those of us who paid for proper dentistry.

I have always paid for my dentistry so I did find NHS substandard compared to canadian dentists....

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Nope - friend is dentist in Uk and he did a scale and polish on a few teeth for me to see the diff - because I felt left out of the S & P club - was no diff!! I must have lucky teeth :D

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I've been quite impressed with the dentists I've been to in Edmonton and then Calgary and they've picked up a couple of things that should have been sorted out before. However, without a company health plan I would consider the cost very high, probably higher than private in the UK.

NHS is fine for what it is - a lower cost more basic level of treatment. There are still plenty of NHS dentists in the UK despite the occasional headline about queues for dentists. Also there is no charge for children and OAPs so it is a good safety net for everyone.

Like the UK, dentists here will charge the maximum the market will bear. Here I think the market will bear a higher price as the company health plans are probably more common and the dentists can take advantage of that. The NHS alternative probably helps to restrain the wilder excesses of private dentists overcharging in the UK.