Major dental work, private insurance, is it worth it?
I have terrible teeth, holes everywhere, root canal, need braces etc. Wanting to know if getting private insurance is worth it or if I should just save and get the work done gradually. Most companies as far as I can tell have a waiting period and you can only get so much done yearly. We can not afford insurance so would have to do some serious budgeting. I need to do this for me, my teeth constantly hurt, I have a health care card but feel terrible for using those services, someone else needs it more then I. It would be nice to able to smile on pictures with my children. TIA
4 Replies
Don't feel guilty about using the services! They are there for you to use. My advice go to a dentist and get quotes. Once you get the quote then do the sums. Some dentists will do payment plans (my dad just had major work done and went with this method). If you have a relative in the medical industry it's worth looking into the doctors health find as they give a much higher rebate than most insurance companies :)
Have you looked in to the uni dental clinic, the one in Cairns is free if you have a concession card or about half the price if you don't. They do great work and everything is checked by the teachers
Don't feel bad about using the services, although the waiting lists for dental are long (I finally have an appointment with public dental after 12 months waiting). My suggestion is make the appointment to see the public dentist but in the meantime maybe get a quote to find out how much to do what you need privately (a tip though, is that I was told by NSW public dental is they don't do root canal, extraction yes, root canal no). My root canal with crown cost 2500 (which I've heard is pretty normal).
Have a look at smile.com
I joined it last year, it takes a huge chunk off the bills if you use a dentist that is affiliated with them.