I went to 50 different dentists: almost all gave a different diagnosis (1997)

Man I had a really serious overbite as a kid and had a lot of orthodontia work done. I'm obsessive with my teeth now because of it. I'm also the child of doctors and coincidentally, when you're the child of medical professionals, other medical professionals treat you very very well.

I had stellar dentists up until I moved to a new city and had my first experience with a bad dentist. Never again.

Now I'm old enough to know better and here's my advice: brush and floss once a day before bed. Don't eat anything after you do so. If you want to get rid of "morning mouth", rinse your mouth using diluted hydrogen peroxide. Put a very gentle amount of pressure on the teeth using the brush. You don't need to scrub them.

If you can get a descaling from a dentist, take advantage of it. Ask the hygienist to use a local numbing agent on your teeth before cleaning (the gel not the injection). They'll know what this is. It makes the descaling far less painful and sort of pleasant.

When it comes to procedures like crowns or wisdom teeth, only deal with it if there is pain. I had my wisdom teeth removed and I disagree that it was medically necessary. They would have come in normally.

And if you know a medical professional, ask them who their doctor is and then ask that doctor who their dentist/doctor/eye doctor/etc is. Go to the medical professional other medical professionals go to if your insurance allows for it.

Good luck fellow HN friends.

Another read on dental overdiagnosis and outright fraud:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/05/the-tro...

This is the one place I like insurance because it at least gives some cost conscious perspective to proposed procedures.

My insurance sucks but at least it’s useful that insurance considers optional what my dentist says is essential. For example, my dentist only does tooth colored fillings and my insurance doesn’t cover them. My dentist says the covered ones are unsafe.

It’s a weird situation. My last dentist said I needed an “emergency crown” because my tooth would shatter at any moment. It was $3000. My insurance covered $600. The dentist said it was because my insurance was terrible.

Another dentist said the crown was optional and would cost $1800. That’s almost a 100% price difference.

And my most recent dentist says I don’t need a crown at all and it’s been two years since the “emergency.”

I’m not sure what’s going on, but of course it’s impossible to compare prices when choosing dentists and I don’t trust new dentists at all.

Beat me to it. This is a superb article and I highly recommend that everyone read it in full.

My wife was shocked to learn in dental school how many people were there focused on the money. From her experience I learned that dentistry in particular is a profession that has a low investment / high payoff ratio. Relative to medical school dental school is easier to get into and shorter, and unscrupulous dentists can extract a lot of money out of patients.

PS: I feel compelled to share her best advice re oral hygiene:

"You only need to floss the teeth you want to keep."