My past and present tooth extraction experience with financial implications
Have you had a tooth ache? Odontalgia? For the past two weeks, I have endured tooth ache which eventually made me visit the dentist. There's a belief that medical professionals are the worst patients and I kind of believe that. Thanks to my health insurance, I got a referral from my primary healthcare provider and my teeth were evaluated.
Prior to now, in 2017, I had my first tooth extraction experience which lasted 90 minutes. Despite being an adult, I cried, the professional extracting the tooth was a medical officer and perhaps his skill was questionable. At some point during the extraction, I almost told him to forgo the extraction due to the pain and discomfort I felt. By December of same year, I had a second tooth removed also on the opposite side due to impacted wisdom tooth as the previous one.
This third tooth I've removed today seems to make me believe that once you remove a tooth or two, the journey may continue. However I have to consciously adhere to the doctor's prescription of changing my tooth brush every three months and coming for scaling and polishing every six months. This is where the doctor takes a doctor's prescription (😂).
MY EXTRACTED TOOTH WAS HANDED OVER TO ME AS A SOUVENIR
Thankfully today's tooth extraction was simple and brief. Sure I took a bottle of malt before the procedure to give me some energy. I had local anaesthesia infiltrated within the proximity of the tooth in focus by the dentist and after about 8 minutes, he came with his instrument and barely 2 mins, the tooth was extracted and handed over to me. I was glad it was brief and the pain was minimal.
I know you may have done the mathematics to know how many teeth I have left (😂) but I'm hopeful this would be my last (even though I feel there's a stubborn one at the other side).
Financially, a preference was given to me as medical professional and also because I presented with my health insurance referral. I offered to buy my drugs willingly partly because I would not compromise quality of drugs. Under National Health Insurance Authority, scaling and polishing costs N3500 ($4) and the extraction is at N10,000 ($11). The drugs and miscellaneous can round up the whole procedure to N20,000 ($22). And as an enrollee under the health insurance, what I was due to pay was less than a dollar which was approximately 10% on drugs.
INSTRUCTIONS GIVEN TO ME AFTER TOOTH EXTRACTION
I was given some antibiotics, analgesics and instructions to follow such as gargling with salt water before and after each meal for the next two weeks. I would definitely try to adhere to this instructions as I remember having a complication of empty socket when I had my second tooth extraction and had to be re-incised at the site of extraction.
MY HUMBLE FACE RIGHT BEFORE THE TOOTH EXTRACTION
Tooth pain can be severe and we liken it to labour pain. It can wake you up from sleep and like my friend recently 
It's important we take our dental hygiene more important. I'll state a few below:
A. Brush your teeth with appropriate toothbrush and preferably a medicinal paste every 12 hours (morning and night).
B. Change your tooth brush every three months.
C. Visit the dentist for a scaling and polishing every six months
I hope the above suffices as preventive measures against tooth problems.
Thank you for reading. I'll appreciate your comments and contributions.
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