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- Jan 8, 2008
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Sit back and get ready for me to unload on my thoughts. Some may agree others may disagree. Only time will tell, but its trending now.
1) OMFS will be dropping plans and will stop accepting most insurance. Including dental and medical, also Medicare.
The amount of money I get back from dental and medical insurances is laughable. This is a business not a charity practice. Sure I do charity but I run a business also. Insurance reimbursement is low and getting lower. Most of my oral surgery friends stop taking insurance and are fee for service. Others are slowly eliminating the bad insurance plans. As time goes on the bad ones increase and thus more plans will get eliminated. Cigna Medical slashes each wisdom tooth in half. By the time you get to the last wisdom tooth your making 50 bucks maybe. Other plans deny payment even after you do the surgery. Lets talk about TMJ and Ortho Surg. Its rare to find plans that cover this. Hell, I find it hard to find a plan to cover a bone graft after a maxillofacial trauma. The case numbers within this field will reduce because of this. Its easier to not accept insurance and thus most surgeons are following. The public needs to get ready for this. I have patients driving 40--50 miles to see me because I am the only idiot to still accept their insurance plan.
2) The amount of pedo oral surgery cases I do is almost zero. This is a change from years ago.
Most pediatric dentist are now bringing in an anesthesiologist to sedate these patients in their office, thus making our ability to sedate patients useless. Come on. Most ped dentist can take out primary teeth and do a frenectomy. They send them to us due to behavioral issues. Now with the advent of an anesthesia doc coming to their office with all the equipement needed, these procedures can stay in house, and thus the lack of these referrals. Sure some complex stuff still will be referred out, but compared to years ago. Its dry my friends and only going to get worse. If you dont have this in your town, just wait.
3) The referrals from a GP is on the decline and will continue as younger dentist enter the work force.
This pertains to younger dentist not the older established ones. Younger dentist are in debt, hungry to do cases and learning implant dentistry or oral surgery within their program. If not they are taking CE courses for these skills and YES also IV sedation. This scarres me because all it takes is a couple of GP sedation deaths and the whole field of dentistry is screwed, mainly the OMFS who will now need a anesthesia doc in their office. But to get to the point. GP are now placing implants, ext, doing all on 4, IV sed, biopsies, bone grafts, etc. Some are even doing wisdom teeth. If you dont see it in your community yet, just wait.....Or the dentist are having multi-specialist enter their office to treat their patients and getting a cut of the money. I see it happening now and only increasing as economic times continue to decline.
The change is slowly coming and will affect our speciality. This is all without the mention of Obama Care. Who the hell knows how thats going to affect us, but I can assure you it wont be for the good. Stay tuned because things are changing.
1) OMFS will be dropping plans and will stop accepting most insurance. Including dental and medical, also Medicare.
The amount of money I get back from dental and medical insurances is laughable. This is a business not a charity practice. Sure I do charity but I run a business also. Insurance reimbursement is low and getting lower. Most of my oral surgery friends stop taking insurance and are fee for service. Others are slowly eliminating the bad insurance plans. As time goes on the bad ones increase and thus more plans will get eliminated. Cigna Medical slashes each wisdom tooth in half. By the time you get to the last wisdom tooth your making 50 bucks maybe. Other plans deny payment even after you do the surgery. Lets talk about TMJ and Ortho Surg. Its rare to find plans that cover this. Hell, I find it hard to find a plan to cover a bone graft after a maxillofacial trauma. The case numbers within this field will reduce because of this. Its easier to not accept insurance and thus most surgeons are following. The public needs to get ready for this. I have patients driving 40--50 miles to see me because I am the only idiot to still accept their insurance plan.
2) The amount of pedo oral surgery cases I do is almost zero. This is a change from years ago.
Most pediatric dentist are now bringing in an anesthesiologist to sedate these patients in their office, thus making our ability to sedate patients useless. Come on. Most ped dentist can take out primary teeth and do a frenectomy. They send them to us due to behavioral issues. Now with the advent of an anesthesia doc coming to their office with all the equipement needed, these procedures can stay in house, and thus the lack of these referrals. Sure some complex stuff still will be referred out, but compared to years ago. Its dry my friends and only going to get worse. If you dont have this in your town, just wait.
3) The referrals from a GP is on the decline and will continue as younger dentist enter the work force.
This pertains to younger dentist not the older established ones. Younger dentist are in debt, hungry to do cases and learning implant dentistry or oral surgery within their program. If not they are taking CE courses for these skills and YES also IV sedation. This scarres me because all it takes is a couple of GP sedation deaths and the whole field of dentistry is screwed, mainly the OMFS who will now need a anesthesia doc in their office. But to get to the point. GP are now placing implants, ext, doing all on 4, IV sed, biopsies, bone grafts, etc. Some are even doing wisdom teeth. If you dont see it in your community yet, just wait.....Or the dentist are having multi-specialist enter their office to treat their patients and getting a cut of the money. I see it happening now and only increasing as economic times continue to decline.
The change is slowly coming and will affect our speciality. This is all without the mention of Obama Care. Who the hell knows how thats going to affect us, but I can assure you it wont be for the good. Stay tuned because things are changing.
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