Old dentist retired. New dentist says I need a lot of work
I have been going to the dentist every 6 month .My old dentist retired so I had to find a new one. I am on my second appt with the new dentist. He says I need 3 root canals due to broken fillings. Old dentist said 2 had to be watched due to being deep. Does this sound right? First appt hygienist saw me and did x-rays and said my teeth were beautiful and only had 1 that had to be watched.
Does this sound like a dentist looking for money or does it sound like my old dentist should have done work but didn't.
Need advice.
Posted Nov 2, 2019, 5:27 PM UTC
1119
Without xrays there’s no way to know. I will say when I purchased my practice from a retiring doc there was lots of work for me to do
Do retiring dentist tend to hold off on work? I just find it weird I went from teeth having to be watched to 3 root canals and a deep cleaning needed. I am going for the last section of deep cleaning and the first root canal next sat. I want to make sure this dentist isn't trying to just get money out of me. I don't have any current pain.
Retiring dentists are done. They've made their loans off, they own the practice, they're ready to retire and stop putting up with everyone's bullshit. They know patients don't want to have work done, and they don't have the fight left in them to argue with you about it. They'd rather just sit back, collect the fees on the cleanings, and let you come to them when the problem gets to the point where you're ready to do something. Why rock the boat and lose patients this close to retirement when in part the value of selling the practice is in how many patients are in it when you sell? In general, why rock the boat at all?
Also, lots of older dentists are chronically guilty of under treating gum disease because it is difficult to tell a patient that you have been seeing for years that their brushing sucks, and they have slowly been deteriorating for a decade. That's when patients get upset and throw it back in your face saying how "I've been coming in every 6 months" when in reality it probably closer to once every 9-12 months, and they're a shit brusher in between. Why open up that can of worms. Let the new guy deal with it.
You don't need to feel pain to have problems. C'mon.
Just go chevk w a 2nd dentist for heavens sake! Do NOT pursue root canals (and the crowns etc you’ll likely need after!) without being fairly confident it’s truly necessary. There is necessarily a lot of subjectivity in diagnosis and treatment planning and the best you can do is to get input from multiple sources. I always tell my patients that there are things that you need to do, things that you should do, and things that you could do.
Please do not do anything as invasive and costly as route canals just because one person suggested it especially if you are not having symptoms. Now I am the first to say that just because things don’t hurt doesn’t mean that you don’t need treatment. But it can’t hurt to double check with another source to be on the safe side to make sure that what the first dentist is recommending is not unreasonable because it could very well be that they are looking to just drive up there bottom line.Of course it could also be the case that your last dentist was kind of “phoning it in” In the years prior to retirement just because they didn’t feel like arguing with people or explaining what might be challenging to explain in terms of need a treatment. So it could go either way just get a second opinion
And go to an endontist for a root canal so they can cone beam your mouth and make sure they don’t miss a root passage that you find out about 3 years later.
Theres no way OP is paying 400 bucks to take a cbct given he 'has no pain.'
CBCT on every single RCT would be excessive in most cases. Maxillary molars sure, whatever, but if you're talking about most teeth you're not gaining much information from a CBCT
Failed root canals or root canals that appear to be complex may benefit from a cone beam prior to treatment. Otherwise standard 2D images are perfectly adequate.
How’d you find the new dentist
Its through my dental insurance. Also looked at the reviews. Had more good reviews then bad.
You could always ask friends who they like. Go out of network even.
You dont feel pain when you have chronic high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or a million other things. When you feel pain, it tends to be too late with teeth.
[deleted]