I saw a dentist a few days ago; my right teeth have been bothering me for a few weeks. Aside from a deep need for a deep cleaning, he gave me some bad news. It’s time again for a root canal.
This is on a tooth that was patched up last year at Castle Dental. Remember my travails with all that dental nonsense? It seems the prior dentist either didn’t remove the whole cavity before doing the filling or he didn’t do the filling well. Either way, I have a cavity that’s just about reached the nerve, a filling that’s coming loose, and I’m screwed bigtime.
My dentist referred me to a specialist in Westlake to do the actual root canal procedure; I called that office yesterday to set up an appointment and got a quote: $743, which is absolute BS.
“Oh no no no, that won’t do. You said you accept my insurance, don’t you?”
“Yes, we’re a contracted agent, but you’ll have to pay out of pocket, and then your insurance may reimburse you according to their policies. If necessary, we could even let you go half-and-half on payments.”
“Still, I can’t do that. Cancel the appointment.”
So today, I called my insurance. It’s true: the specialist is a contracted agent, and they accept my insurance, but that only gives me a 20% discount on services since they’re a specialist. Any regular dentist would fall under the usual insurance fee scale meaning my copay would be $212, a much more agreeable sum. So I’m left with searching for a regular dentist who does root canals. I know of one clinic, but I don’t know if I want to deal with Castle again. Their work on my first root canal was prompt, in-house, and covered under my plan, but I’d have to deal with Castle Dental again.
My tooth is starting to hurt. Time to make a decision soon.