Korean Job Discussion Forums

[guava]

[sesyeux]

how much is dental work in korea? more expensive than back home?

[EH]

I had an old filling fall out in Korea.
The dentist at my Uni was happy to fill it again for me very cheaply (like 15K won or something), with mercury amalgam that left fairly large toxic shavings in my mouth for me to crunch on and swallow. She also nearly drowned me with the water sprayer thing, and when my desperate gurgling, choking, wild eye rolling and arm flailing failed to alert her to my impending doom I had no choice but to sit up... which caused her to cut my whole lip open with the drill. She cursed me out for that and I was too intimidated to think to ask for an apology. I didn't know how bad the cut was until the anesthetic wore off later and I saw it in the mirror.

Anyhow, after that it hurt just like yours did. When I bit down, when I chewed, and when exposed to cold or heat. After a few weeks I (insanely...) went back to her and asked her to fix it so it wouldn't hurt. She drilled out some of the filling so my teeth could bite together better. It was better. But it still hurt.

Back in the States later a dentist offered to replace that filling again. She did. It was even more painful than before. But it cost so much that I waited a year in pain before having the money to do anything about it. For a year I could only chew on one side of my mouth.

Finally I went to a mercury-free dentist and he took out the filling and replaced it with a crown. I love that tooth now. No more pain. Finally. He told me that sometimes bad fillings do not adhere 100% to each tooth surface, and somehow that causes the pain. He said any dentist can mess up like that sometimes. But I also think he's an awesome dentist and way, way out of the league of those other dentists I went to. Find yourself a dentist you can really trust and don't go back to the one who caused the pain.

[PeteJB]

I dunno what to make of it TBH. It still aches a little bit if I eat hot food (though not as often) and it tends to feel inflammed in the morning. The strange thing is, the opposite side of the mouth hurts a little bit when I bite down which wasn't a problem before. It's not causing a lot of discomfort anymore but I guess I'll need to get it treated...