To think paying £300 for tooth extraction is a joke

[Tiredjoanna]

So, have had toothache for couple of years in 1 specific broken tooth. Always got by with strong painkillers and oragel. However for the past week the pain was immense so ended up having to go to an emergency dentist who I had to pay £50 just to look and do quick x-ray. So, he told me it's an infected root of tooth and I'd need an extraction but not a basic one as there isn't enough tooth to pull on to get it out. So scrape it to the root basically, a 10 minute job he said. And then proceeded to tell me it would cost £300!! Now i know they're doing a specialised job but really? I cannot find an NHS dentist by me anywhere so can only go private. Is this a normal price for an extraction or am I being completely unreasonable. Fwiw I seriously don't have £300 so am at a loss. Sorry for the long post

Ah @Lollygaggle I didn't think about that but it makes sense, I am in Scotland

£75 for a course of treatment that may take several hours if someone needs several fillings and extractions will mean a dentist is working for less than minimum wage after expenses are paid and the business will not even cover its overheads .
This is why dental practices are closing because they cannot cover the overheads and if they are in an area of deprivation people cannot afford private charges. Eg BUPA recently closed 85 dental practices.

I am actually covered for another 2 weeks when baby turns 2. However I had to pay £50 for a private prescription and the chemist said that I had to pay the £9 for it as it was private. So £60 for something I could have got free if didn't need it straight away and waited for doctors appt

I’m an American who just paid $ 75- for a dental X-ray, and will pay $ 200- for a filling in a chipped tooth which will resolve my pain. My dentist is a sole private practitioner in a fairly basic suburban office. GBP 50 sounds fairly reasonable for an X-ray with consultation.

Thank you @Lollygaggle for trying to explain the UDA mess.
I post on every dental thread and say the same- NHS dentistry is dying. In many areas it is dead. On a population level you can campaign to the government. On an individual level the only option is to pay privately. Think of it like opticians or vets.
NHS dentistry has given the U.K. public a weird idea of what dentistry actually costs.
I do have sympathy for people with pain and problems who can’t afford private. That sympathy doesn’t run to charity - ie paying for it myself! Which NHS dentists effectively do.
If I ran the world exempt patients- so those on benefits and children- would have easy access to a core service of basics. Exam, simple scale, fillings, extractions and plastic dentures. The dentists who worked there would be first year post graduation and would be salaried with crown indemnity.
Foundation training as it is now would be years 2 and 3.

I remember my dentist saying that dentistry had advanced a lot in the last few decades in terms of what would be done to save teeth but NHS funding had not caught up.

And as I have said before I think one of the huge failings of the NHS full stop is it does not encourage or incentivise preventive actions or behaviour.

I go to the hygienist regularly as it helps prevent issues but that has only ever been a private service.

Quite, when I qualified back in prehistoric days , the instruments we used for root treatment (endodontics ) were reusable and fairly basic. Today , even in NHS practice , we use systems that are one use only and cost a minimum of £35 a patient and materials such as mdta or biodentine which are used in root treatment and to save teeth from needing root treatment are £90 a use .

A pot of glue used to cement fillings in , even on the NHS , is £95 for 5ml! Dental inflation is running at over 10% a year for materials , labs etc and yet NHS funding to dentists increased by 3.5% this year , which means for around the 15th year in a row , in real terms, NHS dentistry is facing yet another cut .

Have you tried phoning 111? If you can't get in an NHS dentist and it's an emergency perhaps they will refer you to Birmingham Dental hospital?

I do a lot of NHS dental anaesthesia.

When I needed a new dentist the unequivocal advice I got from all my dental colleagues and I canvassed loads was to start paying for dental treatment because the NHS no longer really offers preventative dentistry.

Dentists will offer the treatment that loses them the least amount of money or they won't exist.

I now have a lovely private dentist who is my age and went to Uni with one of my dental colleagues and several of my own dept but it pisses me off every time I pay him multiples of my hourly rate to have something really simple done.

He also does no one call and only works 4 days a week.

I think I picked the wrong bloody degree.

‘Only care Only get pence for nhs patient’ what an awful thing to say. Are you a dentist? Would you want to get paid for going to work after 5 years of uni? Why should they work for free? It’s a underfunded NHS issue… not the dentists fault. Blame the government.

The multiples per hour you pay defray the upwards of £200 an hour it costs to run a room in a private dental practice .

The simple job is actually microsurgery performed in a tiny confined space in a conscious patient using a mirror and lights to overcome the lack of light and vision.

Birmingham has a huge dental teaching hospital hospital. Try them

Ach, I had to pay over £1200 for dental treatment recently (money I DO NOT have). It's weird how much things are changing...

It's £1,000 for a root canal here.

Just wanted to update everyone who replied. Spoke to my normal dentist who said that a complex extraction which is what i need would cost £125. Now that to me seems more reasonable than £300 so will await wages and book myself in. Never want to feel that pain ever again. Thanks to everyone who took the time to reply😀

How much do you think a skilled clinician's time is worth? After all their training and expertise? After the cost of keeping a clinic open; rent, utilities, staff, insurance, materials. It takes them 10 minutes because they've spent years training to do it professionally.

I'm not saying their time isn't worth spending for, just that £300 seems excessive when I can get it for £125.

Get a cheap flight to Croatia, I know someone who does that and it's so much cheaper, 7 euro for a check up.