Return to Essays menu DENTAL HEALTH OR MANAGED CARE Recently there has been a lot of information circulating about managed care, changing insurance plans and health. There are some very important facts that may impact decisions about your dental care and health. The most important fact is that prevention of disease is the best for the patient. Health means no cost for treatment because there is no disease to treat. No disease means health, optimum function, longevity, comfort and savings of time in care, both home and professionally. Disease treatment and re-treatment simply take from the patient. The next important fact is that quality care saves time, discomfort and money while maximizing esthetics, function and longevity. "Retreat dentistry" is ultimately more expensive in cost, time, tooth structure and often results in dentures. Quality care and health is synonymous with quality of life. Dental care and medical care are not the same. Dental diseases are preventable whereas medical problems are inevitable. As a part of total health care costs, the dental portion has decreased to 6% while medical treatment has increased to 45%. Dental insurance coverage has a modest cap ($1,000 to $2,000 per year) which has remained the same for the last twenty-five years. Medical insurance caps are in the tens to hundreds of thousands. What applies to medicine is not applicable to dentistry. As such, providing care under the same model is illogical and unsound, unless one chooses a dental disease model destiny of no teeth, resulting in full dentures. Confusion is a tool of manipulation. Currently, managed care is being represented by PPO's, Capitation Plans, HMO's, DMO's, and IPA's. All represent some form of contract with the professional to reduce fees and provide a comfortable management fee for the insurance company and commission for the sales agent. The fixed overhead of a dental office is high and not flexible, therefore any reduction in fee severely challenges the viability of an ethical practice. Many practices offering this form of care are now discovering that some of these plans keep the patient-flow high but show no profit and, as a result, plans are failing. Compromise becomes necessary to survive. What areas are affected? Some may include cleanliness, quality, materials, waiting time, thoroughness, treatment time and always less attention to prevention. You have a choice. Through our practice, you are given the opportunity to learn about your dental health condition and how to maximize your health. You are provided excellent care in a professional, relaxing atmosphere with gentleness and respect. Since PREVENTION IS THE KEY to your dental health and dental budget, the decision between a health model and disease model is clear and simple. Proof of preventive dentistry is the fact that most of our patients require little or no dental work once they become healthy. Patient health is a compliment and a reward to our practice. This does have a downside, however, and that is our patients of record need little or no care. New patients provide for the economic health of our practice. This is where you can help. As your friends and neighbors discuss or experience the disease model of dentistry, we would be most grateful to you for sharing our dental health philosophy with them. We consider it the highest compliment when we receive referrals from our family of patients. We do our absolute best to care for those you refer, as we would for our own family. Feel free to copy this information and share it with a friend and please do so with our gratitude. return to top