Most of the time, when you buy health insurance, it is upsetting to know that the company does not cover dental treatments. There are many questions associated with dental insurance not being covered by the medical insurance. For example, why the medical insurances do not cover the whole body, after all, it is part of the human system.
There are certain reasons due to which the dental work is not covered by medical insurance
- From the very old times, dentistry is considered to be a separate entity. The medical field does not like to include the dental field in its practice. Although very naïve to say that teeth are not part of the body. This concept still prevails. This not only made the partition between the two. Also, the coverage systems differ for both, rather than considering it as one entity.
- Similar to the medical carriers, dental carriers are specialized in dental policies and helps the patients to invest money in the best available dental plans. Hence medical carriers look only for health coverages excluding dental health and dental carriers only look for dental health coverage programs. Again this creates a rift between the two practices.
- The health coverage providing programs, perceive dentistry and medicine in opposite directions. This in reality is not true. As the mouth is a part of the body, teeth and related structures should be considered as one entity rather than separate.
Since dental treatments are expensive around the globe, a lot of patients do not opt for dental treatments. And most of the time patients do not even possess insurance plans that cover the cost of their dental surgeries and treatments.
In the Philippines, health insurance companies do cover dental treatments but in a separate and limited way. A dental health maintenance organization HMO, contracts with the number of dental practitioners who offer dental treatments to insured members at fixed rates. These dental practitioners work collaboratively as a network to provide dental services. However, a dental HMO does not reimburse if the insured member sees a dentist outside their network.
First and foremost it should be noted that dentistry and medicine are not separate rather both are interchangeable, linked and both are highly important to live a healthy life. Routine visits to dental health care professionals should be made mandatory to catch any dental disease at its earliest rather than at a later stage where you got to pay higher charges than usual such as in endodontic procedures. As it is said prevention is better than cure. Preventive procedures should be availed as much as possible as most dental insurance companies cover only preventive dental care.