Viewpoint by Dr. Michael Arnold Glueck
Not so long ago, dentistry was a dying industry. Lots of guys with hairy arms and wristwatches with little to do but drill and fill cavities.
And these holes decreased in number as we added fluoride to the water and every conceivable type of toothpaste to the medicine cabinet. Moreover, insurance companies were clamping down on dentists as they were every other doc.
But then someone realized that a bright smile was as remarkable as a straightened nose or any other surgically corrected or enhanced piece of anatomy.
All of a sudden, dentistry became the new vanity industry. Everyone had to have Chicklets teeth,perfectly aligned, well designed, whiter and brighter. General dentists metamorphosed into cosmetic dentists.
And thus dentistry solved all of its problems at once. There was instantly lots to do, prices rose dramatically, and people paid for it themselves, thus allowing dentists to avoid the insurance hassle. (Sadly, it’s a fact of life that the American patient will pay far more and complain less for cosmetic treatment than for life-saving medical or surgical treatment.)
Dental ads with before-and-after mugs appeared everywhere,in medical mags and in local throwaways,for bonding, veneers, crowns, two-hour “power” whitening and Invisalign orthodontia.
You, too, can look like a star! No matter how bad your smile or teeth, the tooth-fairy docs, as promoted by TV shows such as “Extreme Makeover” and “The Swan,” can make you shine.
Have you noticed in the society pictures that everyone has the same open-mouth, upper-teeth smile?
That’s because a favorite cosmetic procedure is the snapping on of six to eight upper veneers at $2,000 a pop. The socialites want to show off those upper beauties and thus have trained themselves to lift that upper lip and hold it.
If you lack megabucks, you practically can do it yourself with over-the-counter products. Have you been to the drugstore lately? The dental aisle used to be toothbrushes, toothpaste and floss.
Now those come in dozens of brands, sizes, shapes, colors and stripes. And now there also are pastes, ultrasonic cleaners, electronic brushes, curved and rounded tongue scrapers, mouthwashes, brighteners, anti-plaque solutions, cool mint power pack oral care strips, enamel restorers, age defiers, gum stimulators, whitening strips and peroxide gels. Whiteners come in 15-minute, one-hour, two-hour, 24-hour and two-week varieties.
It confuses me, and now it even frightens me. On my latest trip down the aisle I saw metal picks, probes, scalers and resins for fixing your own cavities and materials to seal your own crowns.
I haven’t spotted any dental drills, lasers or home X-ray machines, but I’m keeping an eye out. I expect some entrepreneur eventually will sell a dental bit that fits in a home drill.
Take good care of yourself. In this era of expensive out-of-pocket cosmetic care and stingy managed care, you have no other choice.
Besides, even if spending $10,000 to $20,000 on new teeth leaves you feeling unhappy, you’ll always want to smile.
Dr. Glueck of Newport Beach comments on medical, legal and ethical issues.
