Dental Work overseas / "Dental Vacations"
 

I am a US citizen & self-employed. Unfortunately, I don't have decent dental coverage as a result of being self-employed.

I've seen stories in the press about US citizens going abroad for medical and/or dental vacations. Instead of shelling out massive $$ to a local dentist, I'm considering taking a "Dental Vacation".

I'm interested in hearing from others who have made such trips, where they've gone to, the quality of work done, and I'm open to suggestions. If anyone could recommend a specific destination and dental practice, it would be much appreciated. PM's or Private emails are welcome.

Thanks! SDF_Traveler

I know there are previous threads on this topic in, I believe, the Thailand forum and perhaps other places.

My son had two impacted wisdom teeth removed at the Bangkok International Dental Center last year (they have a website) and just last weekend had his last wisdom tooth removed there. I've also had a crown from them. We've been very pleased with the work there (are large number of their clients are tourists and ex-pats). My dentist in the San Francisco Bay Area was quite impressed with my crown and very amazed by the low cost. Likewise the dentist my son sees in California was impressed with the oral surgery.

My son is in Bangkok with a group of students and professors from MIT. One of his professors had a root canal at a different facility in Bangkok and she was very displeased with what she saw there. She's now going to be taking her son to BIDC for his wisdom tooth extractions.

I've referred friends there for dental work and they've also been very satisfied.

would you travel from Australia or KY ?

if its KY then Costa Rica would be a very good choice. I have at least 4 friends that came here for that very reason.

Sorry - need to update my location; would be traveling from KY.

I was recently in Costa Rica and am actually planning my next trip once the rainy season is over. If you have any recommendations, they'd be appreciated.

On some streets in the more urban areas of Thailand you would swear, judging by the number of "Zahnarzt" signs that you see, that dentistry was a national pastime. I wouldn't hesitate to go to a Thai dentist for the more routine treatments. For more heavy duty work that involves oral surgery I would go to the dental departments at one of the major Thai hospitals.

I get all my dental work in Costa Rica, about two blocks away from my house. Not a fancy office, and she doesn't speak much english, but she does all the work herself.

The cost is 20-30% of what a normal (AZ) dentist would charge, and the work is much better.

There are a number of dentists who advertise in the gringo magazines and such, but they'll charge twice as much as a normal CR dentist. Some people need a lot of hand holding, and want a billion gadgets, gas and other stuff. I don't need that much. ;)

Buenos Aires and Bangkok are two other places that I've heard good stuff about their dental work.

I recently had an uncle that had a bridge done in CA recently. He's had problems with it for 6 months now, and it still doesn't fit right. For the $4k+ he spent on it, he could have gone on vacation to Costa Rica in First Class, and stayed at a nice place for two weeks, and still had $1k left over. Or, stay only a week, and fly coach, and he'd have $3k left over!

I've been to Thailand 10 times in the last 5 years, and I don't recall ever seeing a sign for a Zahnarzt. You must be hanging out in the German side of town! :)

I remember seeing signs for dentists in Indonesia (I think), that said "Dr. Gigi". After awhile, I thought it must be a chain, as all dentists showed the same name! Thankfully, I found out that it was just the name they call dentists. Duhhh.

My husband is the author of a well-known internet article on getting a whole mouth reconstruction in Tijuana, Mexico in 2003. We have been very pleased. We did not use the dentist's name in the public piece, preferring to send the name by private mail or email to prevent his office from overwhelmed by the usual internet trolls, but I'll PM the name to you. The office is in an easy to find, safe area of Tijuana, near the Plaza Rio Mall and the McDonald's. Great work, very personable and reassuring, great English, takes credit cards, great prices, and lots of experience with DIFFICULT jobs. Our local dentist wanted an order of magnitude more money to do a job for which he had no equivalent experience.

Maybe it´s too far for you, but in Europe you go to Hungary for a "Dental Vacation".

It's pretty far for you, but dental work in Armenia is pretty good and cheap. I know many people who went there just for dental work.

what about a dental vacation within the us? I should have had my teeth cleaned when I wa in Peru or India recently.

Colombia is also another good option if flying from North America for dental work. With a close family member working as an FA for AC, I've heard numerous stories of AC FA's working down to Bogota and back so that they can get their dental work done there at a fraction of the cost.

I live in Argentina part of the year, and a native Kentukian btw :) and could recommend Buenos Aires as a very good choice for dental work. Really depends on what you need done and the amount of time you can devote to your visit. I have had some cosmetic work, veneers, and crowns and general cleaning etc performed here and with one exception ( bad crown) have had very good luck. But as in any city, there are some good dentist, so so ones and some really bad ones. The ones that tend to garner the dental holiday customers tend to charge higher rates. However, offices are plush, they tend to speak English fluently but do provide good dental services.

I think I paid about $200 usd for a porcelain crown and $350 usd for a crown and root canal.

Sam

My husband has his medical care in Bangkok but had great luck having a crown done in Manila of all places. Said he was the best dentist he'd ever been to and was even able to make some adjustments on his US crowns to have them fit better.

there was an NYT article about going to mexico and getting good work done there