So follow up on my post back a few weeks in this thread. After doing some searching I find that virtually no kind of dental plan or insurance, no matter how expensive will cover dental implants. Kind of sucks, since this is now considered to be a superior type of care as opposed to always covered bridge/crown work. Bridges require grinding down adjacent teeth to anchor the bridge, so you are compromising the health of 2 other teeth just to gain functionality where an implant would leave those two other teeth unstressed. With my poor genetics, all of my teeth are weak, or not the greatest.
But implants cost a good kidney to get done well (outside of leaving the country and having it done in Mexico, which is questionable to quality of care).
There is one dental HMO that does have a co-pay, but it almost seems like the co-pay is most of the% of what an implant would cost if you went to a dentist that specializes in implants
. This seems true given that the cost of implant is the same regardless of which plan you choose, the least expensive @$118/yr or the most @$274/yr
http://www.libertydentalplan.com/ca/individuals/ca50.shtml
Shoot, top quality laser eye surgery costs less than a single implant.
If you get a dental plan, some have negotiated 10-25% off the practitioners normal rates, when you see a specialist in the network that does implants...which
might end up being less expensive than the HMO above^
http://www.costhelper.com/cost/health/dental-implant.html
^See these horror stories about costs/problems
