Wisdom Teeth Series: Covered by Dental Insurance?
Posted in Dental Insurance , Health Insurance
September 29th, 2009
If you or someone you know needs to have wisdom teeth removed, and you have good dental insurance, the odds are likely that your dental insurance provider will cover all or some of the procedure. Not all dental insurance providers will cover the extraction of wisdom teeth, however, and before you make any assumptions, be sure to check with a representative of your dental insurance provider and verify what’s covered and what’s not. While it may be a bit more time-consuming to consult with an actual person, it could be worth it in the long run given that you will get the information first-hand, as opposed to reading a brochure or pamphlet. Everyone knows dental insurance and health insurance coverage are complicated things, and you could easily misread crucial information.
Limited Coverage
Many dental insurance providers may try to limit what they’ll cover, and may not be there for you should you require anything beyond the simplest of extraction procedures. For example, some wisdom teeth may be impacted, which means that the tooth that needs to come out is completely encased in the jawbone and is growing into the neighboring tooth. When such a situation arises, a dentist needs to remove part of the surrounding bone in order to extract the tooth. In some cases, the tooth may be too impacted for a dentist, and the only person who can remove it is an oral surgeon. Under such a scenario, it’s possible that a dental insurance company would be unwilling to pay for such a procedure because they think oral surgery is more appropriately covered by health insurance.
There are many different kinds of wisdom teeth, and many different dental insurance providers. To determine whether your specific provider pays for wisdom teeth extraction, or only does partial reimbursements, be sure to check with a representative of your provider. In fact, it’s a smart question to ask before you sign on with a specific policy in the first place.