root canal treatment - NHS and private costs & pros and cons

alba37

That's a hard one, maybe a dentist will be about who is more qualified to answer your question. My experience is root treatment is very painful, but the temporary fillings the week inbetween treatment were ok, except 1. I had to go to emergency, but got thrown out as it was dental work! It had calmed down by the next morning, thank goodness.

Toothsmith

jazzy wrote:

I had a bit of toothache the other day and visited my dentist. It was not my usual dentist because it was an emergency. I had to have two fillings one was a temporary one and I was told to come back in 15 days for a permanent filling and possibly root canal work if the pain had not settled.

When I had these fillings I found them to be very painful not like my usual dentist. There was also another patient who was screaming with the emergency dentist’s treatment! I am usually ok with the dentist but I am dreading if I need root canal work.

I tried to make an appointment with my regular dentist to see if she could carry out the work (never had pain with her before) But she refused because her colleague started the work.

I had the temporary filling a week ago and since then the pain has gone. So is likely that I will still have to have root canal work carried out when I have the permanent filling?

Hit thanks button instead of 'quote'!

I'm not sure why this is Jazzy.

I assume the emergency dentist you saw was a different dentist within the same practice?

I am also assuming it's NHS.

I am not really an expert on the practicalities of the new NHS contract. I do know that there is a lot of misunderstanding of it out there amongst dentists operating it though.

For a treatment that involves fillings and root-fillings, the dentist only gets credited 3 'funding points' nomatter how many fillings or root fillings are involved.

For seeing a patient in an emergency, a dentist gets credited 1.2 (yes - one point two - what a great system!) funding points.

I suspect the practice you attend is under the impression that those 1.2 points come off the 3 points the dentist doing the work will be awarded, meaning he/she will only get 1.8 points for a filling and a potentially complicated root filling (in money terms, a point is worth about £15-20, but it doesn't really work like that, as you need to get a points total by the end of the year to maintain your NHS funding).

So, your dentist could be thinking, well, he/she has got nearly half the points already - let them do the work. Which, as there is no patient registration with a dentist anymore, he/she is perfectly entitled to do.

My understanding of the contract is that the 1.2 points is seperate from the 3 awarded for the actual treatment. I may well be wrong here - especially if the dentists are in the same practice, as there would be nothing to stop dentists in the same practice seeing each other's emergencies and claiming all the extra units. And the DoH would never snction anything that actually worked to a dentist's advantage!

So - that is what I think is going on here, and I'm not sure you can do very much about it, other than prehaps ring up the practice and see if you can find out if this IS the reason, then ring up the pCT to see if that is indeed the way they interpret the contract.

As to whether it needs a root filling or not, that is something I could not possibly say. just because it has stopped hurting doesn't mean it doesn't need doing.

One thing for sure is that for £60 for the whole treatment, I doubt any dentist will do anything they can get away with not doing!

mr_rush

toothsmith, thanks for the tip about the rubber dam. i asked my dentist if he was going to use one - he did (on the NHS).

Toothsmith

That's a good sign!

tr3mor

I've recently been struggling with a dental abscess. (Under my lower right 6)

At the dental hospital the dentist advised that root canal treatment would be the best method of dealing with an abscess, but they could not do this at the hospital.

So I booked an appointment at an NHS dentist (apparently they *do* exist) to start on a course of treatment. He was of the opinion that it would be better to extract the tooth. He said that root canal work was lengthy and costly, told me that he would do it, but recommended I went to a specialist to have a better chance of success.

He said it was unlikely the gap would be noticeable and that my wisdom tooth would help close it slightly. He also thought that I'd be able to eat normally and there would not be a greater chance of infection.

What are the advantages/disadvantages of root canal work and extraction?

Has anyone had either/both done? What are your experiences?

Is it *always* best to try to save your natural teeth?

j-baby-scotland

Root canal anyday over extraction... can you get another dentist?

Try & get another opinion if possible.

Best wishes
x

Nile

Don't make a decision until you've heard from Toothsmith or Teerah. They are both dentists and often post helpful information on this board.:A There should be a smilie for 'They are wonderful'.:D

Personally, I would do everything to save my teeth and I will do anything to avoid an extraction...........but that's just my point of view.;)

Regards

Nile

Toothsmith

NHS dentists now have a fixed price contract.

For each treatment plan they undertake, they will either get one, three or twelve 'Units of Dental Activity' or UDAs or simply put, funding points.

They will have a target number of points to reach evey year. If they go under - funding is cut. If they go over - tough luck, they've done the extra work for free!

An extraction is a 15-20 min job. Very little aftercare, and is worth 3 UDAs

A root filling, 90mins - 2 h of a job in a molar to do it right (And if you don't do it right, then there is all sorts of problems) and the dentist gets .....


Wait for it.....



3 UDAs!!!

Can you now see

1. Why there aren't many NHS dentists.

2. The NHS dentists there are will be trying to get you to have the simplest treatment plan they can.

3. Why they try to get someone else to do any complex work, or try to tell you it's 'private only?

A root filling on a 6 should be well within the capability of a GDP, and it is wrong of him to try and refer it, and against his contract to tell you it would only be available privately.

Having said that, you may well get a better job done at a dentist who isn't having to worry about funding targets, but that will cost you more.

I would say it is far better to have a well done root filling than to have a tooth out, but it is better to have a tooth out than have a badly done one.

rembrant

toothsmith, I would be grateful for your views on this.

I went for a check recently and was told by back molar would need a root canal filling. The dentist said he would refer to me a specialist for the root canal work and he would then do a crown. The cost would be £600 for the root canal work plus about £450-500 for the crown, making a total of nearly £1100 for one tooth. It sounded expensive to me.Do you think this is about right or would i be ripped off?

Toothsmith

That sounds about right to me.

I take it this was a private dentist with a nice surgery and a very good customer service set up?

If you compare it to the £2000 cost of having that tooth replaced with an implant, it's not bad value at all!

The bottom line is do you feel ripped off? Is the tooth worth that much money to you?

If the practice is nice, with well trained staff, and you can get appointments easily, and the dentist really spends time with you discussing the options for your care, then that is what you are paying for.

The actual unit costs of the nuts & bolts used is not high at all.

If it takes ages to get an appointment, the waiting room is always packed and the dentist constantly runs way behind time. If the surgery looks like it was last decorated by Austin Powers and the equipment is held together with Duck Tape. If you feel like you're in and out in nano-seconds, then he's probably taking the piddle a bit!