Why do dentists have such a bad reputation compared to other kinds of doctors?

Archmage Azor@lemmy.world to No Stupid Questions@lemmy.world – 66 points –
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I recommend reading this article "I Went to 50 Different Dentists and Almost All of Them Gave Me a Different Diagnosis":

https://www.rd.com/article/how-honest-are-dentists/

Went to a new dentist once and transferred my X-rays from my previous dentist. He told me I had 6 cavities.

Wow, don’t you think my previous dentist would’ve told me I had 6 cavities if I really did when he took the X-ray?

Went to another dentist for second opinion and never heard anything about 6 cavities again.

I’ve now moved on to another dentist and still nothing about 6 cavities.

However, I notice all dentists are always looking to add on extra treatments for deep cleaning or extra fluoride or whatever. It’s all about money.

You can’t trust dentists because they’re all conflicted by the business component of their work. This makes many of them scammers willing to damage your teeth to make a buck. You gotta look out for yourself, get second and third opinions and don’t be afraid to drop someone.

This is my experience also. Dentists are basically out to sell you stuff.

I agree, but now let's look at why. Dental insurance sucks, so they can't get paid enough to make them not need to invent work. Sure some are just sleaze, but that is true in any profession.

The only times I've had cavities in my life were the first couple visits to a new dentist.

There is a degree of subjective judgement involved in when a cavity gets bad enough to need a filling, but yeah, that room for judgement is also room for unscrupulous dentists to exploit patients for maximum payout.