In the USA. Up until a few years ago dental visits were nothing to really think about. I went twice a year and got a cleaning. There was one bad place I went to a decade ago that kept “finding” small cavities to “proactively” fill but thankfully I switched to another and all is well. My home care routine is perfect. I use an electric toothbrush twice a day, floss, use mouthwash, wear a nightguard to protect against grinding, and don’t really drink or eat sweets.
Yet two years ago dentists started hitting me with all this talk of periodontic cleanings. Deep cleanings. Scalings, whatever - getting in the pockets under the gums. At this point things took a turn. It started to feel like I was a cash cow being milked for all I was worth. I was even convinced to fork over a few grand for a gum graft. It literally made things worse, like I had more recession after the graph - more of the tooth was exposed. The dentist then gaslit me saying it was totally fine and it didn’t need to be redone even though it was objectively worse than before when they were emphatic that it needed to be done.
Now I go to a new dentist because I move and the entire thing feels like an upsell from front to back. I think I got upsold on procedures four separate times during the visit. They even refused to give me a regular cleaning and told me I had to do the expensive periodontic cleaning where they charge me out the ass. Like what the fuck is going on? My gut after I left the office was just reeling and screaming at me not to trust the dentist. I can’t even put my finger on why, they seemed very professional and answered all my questions. But the gut can pick up on stuff the brain can’t, maybe.
This is all just really upsetting. I’m lucky enough that all my interactions with the medical system so far have not had this air of conning me into doing expensive procedures. Now I feel like I can’t trust these people that went to these crazy expensive/prestigious/exclusive schools to spend years of their lives learning how to care for my health. Am I going crazy? Are dentists really all scammers?
Really, what the fuck is up with dentistry it feels like the most vibes-based medical profession out there. Dentists seem less like doctors and more like salesmen with how they treat oral health, especially wisdom teeth. I swear every fucking dentist will insist that you get them removed immediately as if they’re cancerous but they’re just normal goddamn teeth. How the fuck is this still allowed?? It’s like if doctors urged all their patients to preemptively cut out their appendix and tonsils because they might cause problems later.
Gonna push back a little on the wisdom teeth thing, at least if they don’t come in right they can fuck up your other teeth and jawline just trying to come in, and that’s before getting to the potential for infection for improperly erupted teeth. Until I got mine removed a few years ago, I got tons of infections in the sides of my jaws that were painful as hell for literally days, and I was not keen on rolling those dice any longer.
And your appendix might get an infection and could kill you if it ruptures. Does that mean doctors should default to removing them from everyone? Even before it causes any issues?
My problem isn’t that dentists remove wisdom teeth, it’s that they remove them in completely asymptomatic people as standard practice.
I got my wisdom teeth removed really young because I had an unrelated dental surgery and the dentist was apparently just like, “while we’re in there we might as well get them too” and my parents agreed. That shit sucked so much, I had to pack the deep holes in my gums with gauze for weeks. The rest of my teeth came in naturally straight as well, so I think it was totally unnecessary.