Dental Implant Costs

Here is a very interesting article we found that touches upon the important subject of the rising costs of dental implants and other surgical replacement procedures. The key issue, we guess, is whether the high cost of dental implants will limit their appeal to a large majority of the public, who simply will not be able to afford dental implant treatment? What can be done financially to lower treatment costs for patients? Do you think this will be neccessary to broaden the appeal of dental implants?

“Over a 10 to 20-year time frame, there’s no question that consumers will have to put their hands in their pockets,” declares Chris O’Donnell, the chief executive of Smith & Nephew, the artificial limbs and woundcare group that celebrates its 150th anniversary this year.

“They’ll probably want to. They’ll make a choice: a new hip or tooth instead of a holiday in the Caribbean. I like the story of the taxi driver who isn’t going on holiday this year because he’s saving up to buy his wife a new hip. It’s a new car or a new tooth. It’s a consumer good.”

“The majority of dentistry in this country (UK) is paid for privately and a good set of dental implants is a lot more expensive than a good hip or knee operation. I am speaking from personal experience here. I had my teeth knocked out playing football when I was young so I had to have some implants.”

He chuckles and shows off the false fangs. “A single dental implant is £2,000 or £3,000 in this country. If you have a hip resurfacing product privately, it is about three teeth. I have five of them so l have at least two hips in my mouth. Or I will when it’s finished.”

Sir Chris is trying to find a solution as co-chairman of the Healthcare Industries Task Force, a government-industry body. “We are trying to raise the profile of the benefits of innovative medical technology in the NHS, but it’s a long, hard struggle because there are countervailing forces of cost pressures and healthcare funding challenges.

“They (Consumers) are looking at purchase price only. They’re not looking at the benefit side of the equation, the value to the patient of improvement in their quality of life and in fact the value to the system of doing things properly.”

Sir Chris believes a solution can be found. “What we have got to demonstrate is that [our products] actually help society by having an economic benefit model as well as a clinical benefit model. We can speed up the operation to make our products easy, consistent and fast to implant.

Source: www.telegraph.co.uk
Read the Full Article at:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2006/01/03/ccprof03.xml&menuId=242&sSheet=/money/2006/01/03/ixcoms.html