The less fun part about Spring Break was getting screwed by my Dentist.
We used to go to this bad-ass old school dentist. She worked out of this kind of creepy basement office in some random apartment building. It was a one-woman show, none of that frilly receptionist hygienist stuff. Not even x-rays. She would just look at you and know what was going on, and then dive in for the most painful and most thorough cleanings I've ever experienced. I was a little scared of her, but my teeth were great, and most of all the co-pay was always $20.
And then insurance changed things around and suddenly I had to go to new fancy dentist. Fancy dentist apparently works in a dental spa with little fountains and fancy laser x-ray's that show up on flatscreen tvs. Unsurprisingly fancy dentist's fancy machines found some very fancy gum infection that probably might just go away - but could also kill me unless I had a deep cleaning right now! Deep cleaning apparently would be a $70 co-pay, $90 total with some extra anti-bacterial rinse. Not wanting to maybe die, I figured I could do $90. So I hung out for $20 minutes, did the deep clean thing (What is the difference between a deep clean and a regular clean besides $70? They use different instruments, that get slightly deeper.) swished around some minty stuff, and went up to pay.
Whereupon I was told that special fancy deep cleaning chemical combo was actually $70+$90. Which being $70 more than I had agreed to, didn't sit right with me.
Fortunately I've been trying to get better at the whole responsible, assertive adult who is not cowed by authority things, so got up all my courage to do the adult thing and very politely said that I had been told it would be $90 total, so would they please go and double check? They would, and they did. And came back and just as nicely told me that it was actually $160 per quadrant. As in not just $160, but $160 four times. $640 - which is about $550 more than I agreed to, and about $300 more than I really care about my teeth being fancy extra special clean.
I really wanted to argue some more, to use my fancy lawyer powers for good, or at least my own good. But my fear based on past precedent that I'd somehow end up with a $2400 20-minute cleaning won out so instead I signed the papers and went home to cry and call my Mommy.
WHAT. That is RIDICULOUS!!!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteThat super sucks. I already hate the dentist because my teeth seem prone to cavities and I always need extra painkiller.
ReplyDeleteBut to find out I was expected to pay $500 more than what I had been told would piss me off. There would be major hissy fitting.
Good grief. That's insane.
ReplyDeleteMakes me relieved that my worst dental experiences were A: not enough novocaine once (yeeeouch) and B: a super anal hygienist. Pretty sure that woman actually cleaned out the sinuses above my teeth, she was that thorough.
Holy cow.
ReplyDeleteAlso, find yourself a new dentist. Because that sounds like highway robbery to me. I have never in my life (and my father was in the dental business for 30+ years!) heard of charging a patient PER QUADRANT. Ridiculous.
What!?! That is just crazy.
ReplyDeleteDon't even get me started on the dentist. I keep meaning to go. Really, I do. But it's been almost two years and I just don't wanna. Haha. The adult thing is working so well. ;)
ReplyDeletethat's wrong on so many levels.
ReplyDeletedentists are so friggin expensive... ugh. I feel your pain....!!!
ReplyDeleteI can relate to your experience! I've been charged a ridiculous amount before for regular teeth cleaning. Where's the justice? What I did was I checked out other dental offices in the area. We should not be subjected to financial constraints just because we want to maintain our oral health.
ReplyDelete