Dental plans at Redmond Molloy
Posted on Sun, Jul 18, 2010 @ 04:45 PM
We have launched the Redmond Molloy dental plan to allow predictable budgeting for our patients for all their preventative treatment and 10-15% reduction in costs for treatments such as fillings, crowns bridges and Gum treatmenst etc.
Please conatct any of our practices for all the details on the plan.
There has been an “unprecedented assault” on the State’s dental services because of cutbacks to the dental care scheme for medical card holders, the Joint Committee on Health has heard.
It also heard a claim that the scheme was about to collapse because funds were running out.
The cutbacks announced in April restrict treatment for medical card holders to emergency care. They followed other changes made in the budget that reduced the benefits available to taxpayers under the PRSI dental treatment benefits scheme.
The committee heard about one case where a teenage girl needed five fillings before beginning orthodontic treatment but approval was refused because of cutbacks to the medical card scheme.
Another dentist was refused approval for gum treatment for a young woman with a major psychiatric illness. Her teeth were fine before admission to hospital but six months later she needed six fillings and gum treatment. Under the reduced scheme, she was only entitled to two fillings and no provision was made for treatment for her swollen, bleeding gums.
The cutbacks were announced in a circular issued by the Health Service Executive in April,The circular said additional care must only be considered “in exceptional or high-risk cases”
Irish Dental Association chief executive Fintan Hourihan said the cutbacks had caused “chaos, confusion and hardship” to vulnerable people. He said the content of the circular was “as ludicrous as it is vague”, and no clarity had been provided to dentists or their patients since then.
He said dentists were encountering hardship cases every day as a result of the cutbacks. “In our worst year, we have never seen the chaos that is currently out there,” he said.
Dr Jane Renehan, a principal dental surgeon, said €63 million had been allocated for the Dental Treatment Services Scheme this year and some €59.3 million was already spent. “This system is about to collapse,” she said.
Mr Hourihan said some dentists would be forced to close their practices because of the collapse in patient numbers due to the cuts to the medical card and PRSI schemes.
At a later meeting of the committee yesterday, Minister for Health Mary Harney defended the cuts.Ms Harney said funds for the scheme had been capped at 2008 level.