The Lemon Fool

I have just paid £702 for a gold dental crown. Ouch! That is more expensive than I remember paying the same dentist previously. Nonetheless, this website lists the price of a private crown as £400 to £1,200:

https://www.naturalsmiles.co.uk/blog/de ... n-cost-uk/

I have found my private dentist to be very good. I am getting much better treatment than I did on the NHS. I am sure that there are good NHS dentists, but my experience was not positive.

I wonder how much the material cost was, given that £700 will buy about half an oz.

GrahamPlatt wrote:I wonder how much the material cost was, given that £700 will buy about half an oz.

It is a replacement crown, so they can recycle to old one. I believe gold crowns are still the cheapest. Fine for back teeth.

As I understand it, gold is used for its wear characteristics - similar to tooth enamel, so the opposing tooth doesn’t get over-worn against a harder material (porcelain & acrylic).

GrahamPlatt wrote:As I understand it, gold is used for its wear characteristics - similar to tooth enamel, so the opposing tooth doesn’t get over-worn against a harder material (porcelain & acrylic).

Bitcoin no substitute for gold then!

I've got a zirconium (zirconia?) one which was about £600
Dentist reckoned it should last for at least 20 years, so probably longer than me

GrahamPlatt wrote:As I understand it, gold is used for its wear characteristics - similar to tooth enamel, so the opposing tooth doesn’t get over-worn against a harder material (porcelain & acrylic).

It is not just that. Gold also responds to changes in temperature in a similar way to natural tooth enamel, so you don't get sudden twinges of pain when you eat something hot and cold. And it is more durable and stronger than the alternatives.

I have four gold crowns. I told my wife and kids to make sure they give instructions to whip them out of my piehole when I expire. That's a few hundred quid of their inheritance right there.

Had a wisdom tooth out yesterday, about 25 mins and cost £250 did not mind as causing me trouble, the thing that surprised me recently was a checkup £45 for Dentist, £75 for Hygienist and £7 PPE = total £127. Seems a lot more than I remember from a couple of years ago.

I wonder whether the drop off in business due to Covid has caused the price increases. I doubt whether they will fall if business conditions improve though.

SoBo65 wrote:Had a wisdom tooth out yesterday, about 25 mins and cost £250 did not mind as causing me trouble, the thing that surprised me recently was a checkup £45 for Dentist, £75 for Hygienist and £7 PPE = total £127. Seems a lot more than I remember from a couple of years ago.

For some years I have only had a check up from my dentist and the hygienist and in fact had one last month. Almost exactly the same price, £128 for me. There is the PPE surcharge which hopefully might drop at some point and there is the fact that they are getting through fewer patients per day at the moment. As Geoff says, it is unlikely that we will see much of a drop if/when this pandemic is all over.

Dod

Check up £77 hygenist £77 six-monthly.

I gave up on the NHS several years ago. My dentist says it's on the way to becoming an energency-only service.

Broke a tooth two weeks ago. Bit of old amalgam filling chunk of back molar.
Dentist took close-up pics, X-ray, showed me, and with whiteboard illustrations discussed the options.

Opted for a porcelain onlay. Already have one.
Will be £1,100.

I shall be more careful with crackling in future.But it was a lovely piece of crackling.

V8