A $6,600.00 bottle of ......

[surfpirate]

..... flouride?

I went to the dentist today for a semi-annual cleaning. At the end of the appointment the hygenist takes a small plastic cup and pumps about 10 ml of red flouride solution from a large 3 liter bottle of the stuff. I'm supposed to swish this stuff around for about 1 minute and spit.

When I go to the desk to leave I review my bill and see that they've charged me $22 for this stuff! Twenty-two dollars for 10 ml?!!!! Hell, with all that swishing, I did all the work too!

Now by my calculations ..... a 3 liter bottle holds 3000 ml of this stuff. Doled out at 10 ml per patient that's 300 doses of this stuff. At $22/dose, let's see .....

300 x $22 = $6,600

Right. I don't think so. I refused to pay for it and they removed it from my bill. Insurance won't cover *flouride treatments* either.

What a scam. I told them they should make sure that bottle is heavily insured and gets locked up safely every night.

Thus endeth my pet peeve rant for the day.

[Bicycle Bill]

Actually, SP, this is like the story about the guy whose car was misfiring badly. He took it to the garage; the mechanic listened for a couple moments, then lifted the hood, took off the air cleaner, and adjusted a screw on the carburetor (this is an old story). The car immediately started running better.

The mechanic then presented the driver a bill for $25.00 (yeah, these *were* the good old days). The driver got quite upset and protested, "$25.00 for maybe five minutes of work, and all you did was turn one screw?!!? That's outrageous!! How in the world can you justify that??" The mechanic agreed, and took back the bill and tore it up. He then made out a new one:

Fixing car:
Turning screw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $ 1.00
Knowing which screw to turn . . . . . . . . $24.00
TOTAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $25.00
_______

You were paying more for his technical knowhow than merely the raw materials.
Even so, $22.00 does seem a bit out of line to me, too......

-"BB"-

[surfpirate]

My dentist possesses no more *technical knowledge* about flouride treatments than myself or any other of his patients. I'll grant you he and his staff have technical knowledge and skills I am paying for the cleaning procedures, general checkup, x-rays and x-ray analysis, etc./yada yada. I'll also pay a few percentage points above cost for his office and other overhead.

But swishing 10 ml of flouride ain't one of 'em ..... and especially at that markup price.

[comemonday]

Ewww.... I had to do that last time... it was like foamy fluoride in those things that go over your teeth. It tasted AWFUL; my insurance covered it though, so I didn't notice the cost.