The NobleDentist Blog

Our dentists have occasionally commented to me that dentist fees are climbing too high. And they are concerned that eventually the lower and middle classes will not attend a dentist for treatment of any kind.

A report was just released from the Social Policy Research Centre at the University of New South Wales that relates to the above comment. The report was titled Experiencing Poverty: The Voices of Low Income Australians. Highlighted in this report is the difficulty disadvantaged people are having accessing dental care. You can find the information relating to health on page 16.

Below are a few relevant extracts from the report.

• Affordable health care was a key issue that emerged from all groups, with access to free or subsidised services, such as bulkbilling and a health care card, considered essential for people on low-income.
• One of the client groups also felt that the high costs of private health insurance had excluded many low-income people and therefore caused them to miss out on decent health care.
• Another area where there was strong agreement about the inadequacy of current arrangements was in relation to the cost of dental treatment. Many participants reported that they had to forego major dental work because they could not afford it. While others had waited for years to access affordable dental treatment. As several people mentioned, poor dental health can have flow-on effects in other areas, for example by making it harder for those with bad teeth to compete for jobs.

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