The Shocking Truth About Dental Insurance

The Shocking Truth about Dental Insurance

So if you think calculus, organic chemistry, and quantum physics are confusing, please consider the challenge of dental insurance. And the shocking truth of it all is…there’s no such thing as dental insurance.

And just because dental insurance really doesn’t exist, it doesn’t mean that people don’t get intense when the reality of their plan doesn’t live up to the fantasy.

Just last week, an otherwise safe and sane individual actually threatened us with Yelp-icide if we didn’t write off the balance remaining after her Delta Dental payment.

Thing is, there are somewhere between 496 and 3,264 Delta Dental plans, each tailored to the employer’s ability to pay and will to provide for employee benefits.

And as a health care provider, I’m way more a patient advocate than I am a bricklayer for yet another really tall downtown building with the name of an insurance company on top. But like with Big Macs, when a service is provided, the recipient is responsible for the total burger bill.

So here’s the thing; there really is no such thing as dental insurance. But Delta Dental Discounts (3-D) with yearly maximum benefits straight out of Watergate, President Gerald Ford, and Disco, do exist.

Delta Dental Discounts and real medical insurance are often confused for the same breed of premium paid security…but actually…their DNA has about as much in common as Tommy Lasorda and Sarah Palin.

Typically, medical insurance provides greater benefits the more catastrophic the health concern. With Delta Dental Discounts, more extensive care is met by decreasing benefits.

If you’ve waited 10 years to see a dentist because you didn’t have dental “insurance” and now need three crowns to restore broken large fillings or large fillings with tooth decay, the usual coverage will pay for one of them per year. And if those numbers don’t sound right, that’s because typical annual maximum benefits mostly haven’t changed in 40 years while everything else has inflated some seven times.

If medical insurance was just like Delta Dental Discounts and you tragically cut off all five fingers on your right hand while building the Mother of all dog houses, your plan would pay to re-attach one finger per year.

Delta Dental Discounts don’t diagnose, plan, or provide care, 3-D helps pay the bills by selling limited discounts (and if you don’t use them, you lose them...especially, before the end of each year.)

These days, oral health has proven strong connections to general health and quality and length of life. If you’re fortunate enough to have dental benefits, please use them. But don’t allow a discount plan to define your care and quality of life.

Main thing, see your dentist; a visit might be worth maybe even another seven years of life… and health and happiness shared with friends and family.