General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThinking about Cecil and the dentist who shot him
Am I the only person who's noticed that for many Americans the only hope they have of dental care is an occasional "get your teeth yanked out free" day in a church parking lot somewhere (and even then it's a crapshoot whether you'll get any yanking done thanks to the sheer number of people who need it) because the price of dental care is so outrageous, but a dentist can afford to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a hobby?
Erich Bloodaxe BSN
(14,733 posts)No way I can afford the obscene amount they wanted for a crown, couldn't even afford to refill the hole after the last filling crumbled away.
arcane1
(38,613 posts)All the more reason to support Medicare for All.
Cleita
(75,480 posts)I hope if we go to Medicare for All that it gets revamped to include dental.
I know of one presidential candidate who has been pushing for that
Cleita
(75,480 posts)I find it appalling that only the well off can afford dental care.
Mika
(17,751 posts)From your link ...
Cleita
(75,480 posts)I realize that you do pro-bono work and thank you for it, but charity only helps so far. Thousands of years of charity has proved it doesn't work because it leaves out too many needy people and frankly it's not fair to the dentist to have to work for free. We need dental care to be included in health care if we ever actually get some national health care that isn't insurance based in this damn country.
Mika
(17,751 posts)US average around $70 an hour isn't much considering the stress and responsibility involved.
Very high suicide rates ...
http://www.newhealthguide.org/Highest-Suicide-Rate-By-Profession.html
a kennedy
(30,138 posts)$4300.00 for the d*mn thing.
Mika
(17,751 posts)The average dental practice in the USA costs about $500-$700 an hour to keep the lights on and staff paid. For those that pay a fair wage to the ancillaries, its even more.
Auggie
(31,331 posts)Palmer must have been good at running that business.
I agree that many procedures are over-priced, but then some of these practices have tremendous overhead and/or are still paying for medical school.
If we had single payer we'd pay less, of course, even for dental procedures. Practices that accept PPOs and HMOs take a beating in reduced fees.
I don't mind that the doctors I visit are paid well. They studied and worked hard to get that license, and the good ones are worth it (up to a degree). Just cut us some slack when all the debts are paid off, including that vacation condo.
BTW, not all dental offices are owned by dentists either. Any one person or group can own and run a practice.
I am not a dentist.
Mika
(17,751 posts)I do plenty of pro bono work too. I know plenty of decent dentists who do not make 6 figure incomes.
Yes, there's plenty of rapacious dental practitioners out there making oodles from Chinese outsourced prosthetics for pennies on the dollar. I'm not one of them... one of the reasons I'm not rolling on dough is that I pay a fair wage to my employees, as well as a fair price for my US made prosthetics to local labs that hire local workers.
Just wanted to disabuse you of the broad brushing sentiment.