What do you do for dentistry?

So it’s ok for other professions to be well remunerated for what can be a stressful job that takes 5-7 years basic training. Every uk dentist has to complete a minimum of 100hours CPD in a 5 year cycle in order to stay on the register. Indemnity costs 5k a year for GDPs, specialists such as orthodontists, implantologists and maxilla- facial surgeons pay much much more.

It is a highly skilled job which require high level of concentration and despite your comment, without a vocation many are unlikely to be successful or enjoy a long career.
The dentists who earn big bucks often work very long hours, six days a week and on top of all the clinical hours will also spend in excess of 10hours a week managing their practice.

Dentistry has one of the highest suicide rates, at least four colleagues I was at uni with have ended their lives. All successful practitioners, but struggled with the overwhelming stress that running practice often brings. Most are related to being sued or investigated by the GDC, often with no case to answer.
I was sued, it took 5 years for the legal team representing the patient to convince them that the case would fail if it went to court. It was a complicated case but had nothing to do with my care and everything to do with the patient travelling without insurance and refusing treatment /advice while on holiday.
Anyway it was five years of my life that caused more than a few sleepless nights. Even when you are 100% certain you have done nothing wrong, the doubt creeps in and you really do wonder if it’s worth carrying on.
Another colleague had a case hanging over her for 15yrs. In hindsight it was a case she should have refused, but it was a family friend and she felt obliged to help her. It ended her career because she became so disillusioned by the whole system so took early retirement.

Like professional sports people one bad decision can end your career. Often you have no idea that it was a bad decision until a letter drops into your doormat.

I am glad I’m in my twilight years professionally. Working privately so I can take my time and avoid the mistakes that high turnover NHS work often leads to. I work in a practice with plenty of specialists who I can refer patients to if they need something done outside of my comfort zone. I can reciprocate by seeing some of the more complex denture and cosmetic work.

Peoples expectations are off the scale currently, they expect high end work for NHS prices. Good luck with that.

Access to dentist is basic healthcare. It is not just about having white teeth.. it is screening for cancer etc.

If the NHS goes private, would you be thinking the same when you find yourself having a heart attack at 2am, with no money in your bank account?

How did he find an emergency dentist? I tried (via 111) and was told I was not an emergency, so they would not help.

Pay for it the same as everything else we need, I don't expect anyone else to pay for it, I'm an adult 🤷‍♀️

So let's get this straight:

If people want access to NHS dentistry, they must accept an increased burden which means to make them pay for, or at least subsidise the rent and utilities to allow the practice to operate and then be able to pay NHS dentists more.

This will make the cost of living crisis worse, as it will take more money away from people and force them to make further cutbacks in spending, ie no more foreign holidays, can't afford the repairs on the car etc.

This means less money being spent in the economy which means less money in the economy, so places can't afford to operate, so they either shutdown or they get the hell out of this country and set up shop in another, more profitable country. Interest rates can't go higher and they can't be lowered, so more money is printed and injected into the economy which pushes inflation up, that's then going to make rent and utilities go up further owing to diminished value of the currency, ie money printing. Don't forget our currency is not based on gold, it's based on debt, it's worthless funny money.

Sooooo.... raise taxes..... AGAIN. More struggle, more decay (excuse the pun) and more misery, but at least every person living in the UK recently born or near death can have lovely, shiny pearly whites without going private. Our glorious, world-beating NHS lives on.

Marvellous.

I'm beginning to think NHS dentistry isn't worth it.

Sorry. I'm very anti-taxation and I do get quite snarky when taxpayers are seen as bottomless pits of money.

I haven't been to a dentist for I don't know, 3 or 4 years. I am still registered with an NHS dentist practice, but my dentist left and apparently they haven't been able to find a replacement.

I guess at some point I will give in and go private.

Don't suppose you're anywhere near a dental hospital or training practice? That might be worth you looking into.

If you can at least get your DS on some where absolutely you must

DH was at the emergency dentist this morning (wasn't registered, just rang up and had an appointment within two hours).

He paid £100 for an extraction and x-rays. This was private, not NHS.

My immunosuppressant medication begs to differ with you, actually. And ADHD teeth grinding.

Can't fix everything with an oral-b and a teepee brush.

I have a hideously expensive dentist who offers payment plans. He is very good but honestly I’ve had it with paying for my teeth. The next one that needs work is coming out!

What a load of smug nonsense. Everything from tooth decay to impacted wisdom teeth has a genetic component to a greater or lesser extent, and then there are environmental influences such as how many pregnancies a person has had. Obviously good dental hygiene is important but it's just not true to say that everyone with dental trouble has brought it on themselves.

Really good private
iO toothbrush
dental hygienist x 2

prevention is better than cure

The private dentists I know of are very well off (fancy cars, houses, holidays) so I assume they make big bucks from private dentistry. It is a very mercenary industry.

I think you really need to take young children to the dentist. Register with the one in London and just get the train there once or twice a year. Are you sure you can’t get cheaper trains if you book ages in advance? Or get the coach which is always cheaper.

This is precisely why most practices have to take on private work because NHS payment is not enough to pay the bills and private treatment subsidises it.
When I qualified around £95 out of every £100 spent on dentistry was spent on the NHS . Now it's around £45 out of every £100.

If the taxpayer wants NHS dentistry then the pay has to be enough to pay the bills , all of the bills and a grand total of £36 per year per patient treated does not pay the bills with the cost of providing treatment going up by 10% each year it becomes less and less economical.

I have just been quoited £580 for two fillings to be replaced by my dentist (ouch) the plan I have will cover half of that but still. I can see upthread how it might cost that much though. Replacing molar metal fillings done in the 1990s.

The checkup (no scans) was 64 pounds. It was 24 pounds a few years back. It seems to have got a lot more expensive since covid.

You completely disregards children of the 60's like me. We grew up without fluoride in toothpaste or the water supply, no dental floss, electric toothbrushes or dental hygienists. We suffered the effects of very aggressive dental practice, where tiny cavities were filled, and fillings replaced often with larger and larger ones. This resulted in mouths full of very heavily filled teeth, crowns and bridges, which require extensive maintenance over the years..

My mother was a victim of this. A generation of dentists performed masses of completely unecessary work and created themselves a lifetime of more expensive work. Its a travesty.

Well of course they have to pay rent and utilities. Do you expect all that to be paid for by the taxpayer aswell? With the way the public purse is abused, I wouldn't be surprised if every taxpayer just turned round and told the pissing government to shove it. I think the lesson here is that nothing is free, and that if you don't pay for things, someone else does

I just haven't been to the dentist in years. I had good teeth, no fillings etc, it never felt i got anything from the appointment.

I brush & floss v diligently and take good care of my teeth. My dad never went for 30 years and had nothing wrong when he did eventually go.

My dentist said they looked for the best plans and found the Simply Dental one seemed to offer best value, we have that now. There are 3 or 4 levels of cover.

There are 2 levels of Denplan. Denplan care which is what you’re on and Denplan essentials which covers check ups and hygienist.

The "true cost" of dental treatment in the NHS per patient treated per year is £34 including patient contribution, that's all a dentist gets to run the surgery, the NHS provides no other money. That pays every expense from the dentist, nurse,receptionist,materials,training,equipment , etc etc

With a room costing upwards of £140 an hour to run how much dentistry do you think a practice can provide on that without going bust?

This is not always true.

Thanks to the monster of an NHS dentist I had back in the 70s, by the age of 13 my teeth were in such a bad state (he had performed silver fillings on every single tooth ever in my head to that point and damaged all the teeth yet to finish growing through) that the dentist was going to call social services on my parents when we moved house and went to a new practice.
Back then, it was really rare for people to call SS, that is how bad he saw it as.

After Xrays, he apologised to my parents as it became apparent that you'd need a full set of dentist tools to do the damage which had been done to my adult teeth.

I was the oldest child so my few years younger sister managed to get away with far less damage and my much younger brother was still a baby with perfect teeth.
On the exact same diet and toothbrushing schedule, what is left of my 'natural' teeth makes me look like a meth addict while my siblings look like they could star in toothpaste commercials.

I'm still living with the fallout decades later and no amount of brushing my teeth or running screaming at the sight of sugar is going to undo that damage.

I'm also not the only adult living with the fallout of the way some NHS dentistry was practiced back then. It was more like butchery.

There are also medical reasons why some people have more fragile teeth or need more treatment, so it's not all down to things the individual can control.j

Edited to add I now live in an area described officially as a 'dental desert' and there has been no availability for NHS dentists in the past 15+ years.
The only dentist appointments my son has ever had were when I paid for him to as a private patient - he didn't need anything other than the check ups, but who would know if you can't get those?

It's criminal what has happened to dentistry in this country.

Freshgreenmintleaves, you aso say in later post that 80 per cent of dental problems are avoidable. That still leaves 20 per cent that aren't. It's really not as simple as you believe.

You completely disregards children of the 60's like me. We grew up without fluoride in toothpaste or the water supply, no dental floss, electric toothbrushes or dental hygienists. We suffered the effects of very aggressive dental practice, where tiny cavities were filled, and fillings replaced often with larger and larger ones. This resulted in mouths full of very heavily filled teeth, crowns and bridges, which require extensive maintenance over the years.

Private treatment for that lot is beyond the reach of many. My dentist tells me my oral hygiene is excellent, but I still require treatment as old work crumbles over time.
Many people have worked and paid taxes and national insurance for a long time, only to find themselves completely abandoned by this government when it comes to dental care.

And it is a national disgrace that today's younger population, including children, cannot access all the dentistry and other healthcare they require when they need it. The cost of living crisis means that very many really cannot afford medical insurance of any kind.

Too many people who can afford to go private seem to take their privilege entirely for granted. Some of them will have a terrible shock in their own time of need should circumstances change. Of course some are so financially safe and secure that this won't happen to them. I just don't understand how they sleep easily in their beds, knowing that their fellows are in dire need.

NHS dentistry and the NHS in general can be saved with the political will to so. I'm REALLY not well off (income now so low I pay little direct income tax as I'm not much above the threshold), but I'd happily contribute more for better services. It seems to be those at the top who don't accept the extent of their social responsibilities.

None in my area. I just pay privately. I don't have loads of cash but I can afford check ups and have had one filling.
Other than that I brush with an electric toothbrush, floss, mouthwash etc. and don't have sugary drinks to try and stave off any issues