Rob Merrick: Ain’t it the tooth?

Mar 5 2008 By Rob Merrick, Liverpool Daily Post

I STEELED myself, last week, for perhaps the third most financially crippling experience in life after buying a house and having kids – a trip to the dentist.

Now, everyone knows NHS dentistry is a sick joke and that the pain of the needle and the drill is nothing compared to the agony inflicted by the monstrous bill at the end of it.

Nevertheless, I was shocked by what I stumbled across at my local – NHS – surgery and, for once, I do not think the Government is to blame.

My eye-opening experience began when I was told the bill for a check-up and one "small" filling (the dentist’s description) would be an astonishing £110.90.

After grabbing the receptionist’s desk to avoid fainting, I resolved to investigate this scandal before my appointment came around and discovered that was the private fee for a white filling.

Many opt for white fillings for reasons of vanity, but a glance at the picture accompanying this column will quickly convince you that should not be a factor for me.

Experts say the NHS- prescribed amalgam fillings – held together by mercury "glue" – pose no health risks and last just as long. And one costs just £43.60, including the check-up.

Problem solved, I thought, as I rang to request an amalgam filling and save myself £67.30, only to be told my NHS dentist was "not funded" to do NHS fillings.

On the day, puzzled, I challenged my dentist as he prepared the anaesthetic. Oh, you can have an amalgam filling if you wish, he said, blaming "confusion" for the misinformation.

Outside, the receptionist refused to own up to her "mistake", denying outright what she had said just a day earlier – that NHS fillings were unavailable. I hate to see a conspiracy to deny NHS treatment in order to line the pockets of a rich, greedy dentist – but I just can’t stop myself.

I felt £67.30 was a sum worth saving.

For many, it is a fortune. Patients need help to understand the bewildering fee structure – not secrecy and lies.

THIS week’s child poverty report made grim reading – a 2010 target to halve the number below the breadline will be missed by 1.6m children, after housing costs. But it could have been much worse.

That figure read 2m , until I rang the work and pensions select committee suggesting there had been a cock-up.

A correction was swiftly issued.

In a swipe, I lifted 400,000 kids out of poverty – more than the Government has managed in years and years.