Root Canal Cost: $1,000 per Molar

Seemed low to me too, but that’s how the data came in.

We don’t track by ZIP code, just by state, which we then group into regions. So “The Northeast” isn’t just NYC, it’s rural Maine too.

For most fees, the Northeast and the Pacific states have the highest numbers in the US. So seeing fees in the Northeast as low as in the South is indeed unexpected. But these numbers include 63 respondents in the Northeast, which is more than enough to be statistically relevant.

Root canal treatment is done when there is no chance of tooth to be saved, and the patient doesn’t want it to be extracted although decayed. It is done to kill the vitality of the tooth and then filling it with mechanical components, and placing a cap over it.
The procedure involves the removal of the nervous elements of the tooth which have been infected or decayed already due to microbial action or any physical pressures.
Root canal Treatment

Had a root canal redone yesterday – cost- $1500! Talk about being profitable for 45 minutes of work. He doesn’t even do the final filling as I have to go to my dentist for that. It’s time that the Congress looks into dental work if it’s going to reform the health system.

You can get them done all day long in Lower Burrell, PA by a good guy for 600 dollars cash, it will take 1 hour.

Rob you And without a gun

where i come from … not the USA that is, root canals done by professionals who got their licenses from US universities cost a mere 35$ to 60$ depending if it’s a dentist or a professor who’s operating the root canal & the cost includes the final filling hehehehe… u guys are litterarly being rubbed out of ur money, better come here and do ur dental work all ur teeth together would not cost u a 1000$… As for implants, average cost is 1000$

My root canal after insurance will be $750, the insurance is picking up about $950.

Root canals are for rich people. Poor people just have to suffer. This country is such a joke the way we treat our fellow countrymen. Greed and excess is the norm, screw the poor. My dentist just gave me an estimate for a root canal, $1775. I have insurance so I would have to pay $623. Who in this economy has over $600 laying around to support some dipsh@t dentist’s porsche and yacht? We need to do something about this. It is a disgrace.

My dentist gives me 50% off all procedures. Im happy to pay him Cash cause it beats Dental plans which only give 10-40 percent off…..

I just had number 30 rear lower molar done, the root canal itself was about 600 and they spent an hour on the tooth and cleaned it out very thoroughly. The crown was 1200, so 1800 total. I am in Grand Rapids, MI. Paid cash.

I actually had to get 3 root canals done. 1 front tooth and 2 molars.

The front tooth was beyond saving so i had that pulled and replaced with a ‘same day dental implant’ which cost $8000 (AUD). You can get an implant for $4000, just takes longer (6 months) to integrate into your mouth.

I then had one of the back molars done which cost around 2200 (AUD) for root canal and cap. The other molar has just been cleaned out, got putty in it at the moment takes several weeks just to do one tooth though so its quite a lengthy and expensive procedure to get done… but it’s worth it, and if you have the money it shouldn’t be a problem to make sure you keep your beautiful smile intact for as long as you can.

I just had a root canal done with a permanent cap the cost was 1700 dollars. I have 4th stage breast cancer and take a medicine called zometa. because of this medicine my teeth cannot be taken out so even though i am on a fixed income and have medicare i have no choice but to pay this or be in pain. i dont know what i will do the next time one of my teeth goes bad. this cost is impossible along with all my other expenses.

I worked with a dentist who also taught at a prominent dental school. Needless to say, this dentist, did more root canals than I have ever seen before! He would open the tooth, go and play on the internet whilst leaving the patient in the chair for the appropriate amount of time needed for a compete root canal. Well, I never saw him chair side actually performing a debridement and lavage of the canals. After the root canals, a crown was immediately placed on the tooth! Then some how the patient was experiencing pain and infection on the ‘root canaled’ tooth.
They would come back with infections that had gone through the bone and were visibly draining. When the root canal failed an impant would be suggested… what was the question are root canals profitable, at this practice they were!

Austin Tx
Performed by a dentist.

I just had a root canal on a #19 molar. It was quite a difficult one that took about 3 hours to work on.

Cost
$950.00 for root canal therapy
$150.00 for build up
1100.00
The crown will be another $1000.00

Now had I gone some place like Omni, Rose, or Castle with AmeriPlan or some other discount plan it may have cost $500-600. Maybe good work, maybe bad work on the root canal.

However, if it gives me trouble within 2 weeks or so from today I will have it pulled. Dentist tend to push the limit when a tooth is questionable and they have admitted it but yet go ahead and do it anyway.

Fleecing patients is a 2 way street. The question is, are the doctors cheating us or are we cheating them if we do not have the funds to pay and end up saying…”screw it”..I have no credit to destroy I cant so I wont pay?

Personally I think the doctors and the ones that don’t pay their medical bills are both equally liars and cheats.

So I reckon that makes us even. We square!!

Hi I’m from Singapore. I just consulted my neighborhood dentist on my lower molar (3rd one counting from the back of the mouth)that causing me pain at night only. He suggested root canal treatment (including the crown) for SGD 1,750. Btw root canal treatment saves teeth that would otherwise be extracted. Although the pulp(that contains nerves & blood vessels)has been removed, the tooth is still anchored in the bone & can still be used for biting & chewing.

#30 molar:
root canal= $500 (endo clinic)
crown w/buildup incl.pins = $1,100 (dentist)
#14 molar
same as above = $1,100
$2,700 to save 2 teeth!

I had a consult with an endodontist who was recommended by my friend’s dentist (mine didn’t know anyone). There is an infection in the bone between two teeth (#7 and #8), though mostly in the front tooth. Because it is between the two and in the second one the canal is closing up and may need surgery if the infection can’t be found,this is a complicated case – according to this endodontist. Most dental receptionists I spoke to (time is a major element here)said that complicated cases get referred to an endodontist. I really hope this guy was truthful, because his cost for the two is three times the price of any general dentist. And of course, I still need crown work on both.

I had a root canal near my home in the Philippines. The dentist was a very experienced female who completed the procedure in two visits. She is not part of the dental tourism circuit so her prices are not inflated. She was not only an excellent clinician, she was (is) a gentle soul who obviously cares for each patient. Her staff was equally wonderful. The best part, I am pain free for the first time in a year, and the gum pimple has disappeared. Total cost for the entire procedure was about $320 USD! I couldn’t be happier. And btw–i had a root canal in the US on the same tooth three years ago, but the dentist messed up and that’s why I had to have the procedure again. There are some awesome dentists and orthodontists in the Philippines. You can fly here, have your dental work done, and get in a nice vacation for far less cost than the just the dental procedure in the USA.

It’s no wonder that Americans especially despise dentists and anything to do with dentistry work and put it off as long as possible, even if they know what’s “better” for them.

A blog about the “wealthy” dentist? YIKES! People are already scared of the pain that teeth problems bring and already wary of the amount of money they know they will probably need to drop, but articles for dentists on how to make even MORE money from their patients?

I know dentists, like all of us, need to make money and where there’s no problem with profitability… but THIS:

“Root canals are the most predictable and profitable procedure in dentistry,” said one. “Dentists who do not do endodontics lose on the average $90,000.”

Predictable, yes. PROFITABLE?! Thanks a lot!

“Beefing up the bottom line?”

GEEZ!

This blog post in particular is doing a major disservice to both the dentists and their patients – advertising root canal therapy as a money maker… and a money maker only.

As a dental patient who has undergone one root canal therapy and is in the middle of doing a second one on a different tooth, this post not only pisses me off because it reminds me of big corporations and their golden parachutes but it also… makes me sad as well.

I should HATE root canal therapies like the plague – even moreso after reading this post… and yet I don’t. And as pissed as I am from reading this post, I cannot regret having my root canal therapy done because I cannot deny that root canal therapy has its use.

8 years ago, my root canal therapy “saved” my otherwise dead tooth (just dead, no cavities and no probable cause) which – owing to its dead state – had caused me excruciating pain in my jaw from the abscess that had formed at the bone owing to the leaking of the dead nerve tissue into the surrounding root area.

The root canal was successful (monitored closely over a year and then less frequently afterwards once it was confirmed to be in a stable state), the infection cleared rapidly, the pain has never come back, my body didn’t react to the materials used, and I didn’t need a crown, cap, or bridge.

The cost was in the ballpark of $1000 to $1250 total for everything – x-rays, diagnostics, procedure, and filling – and my dentist was careful and took his time and completed the procedure in two separate visits.

8-10 years later, that tooth which is MY tooth and not an implant is still holding strong and I haven’t had a single problem with it (or any surrounding teeth) since (much less needing to go to another dentist to get it “fixed”) and it is all thanks to that root canal therapy that I had done.

Right now, I am experiencing the exact same pain problem in the premolar bicuspid on my right side and yeap. It needs root canal therapy done, too.

I went to a different dentist this time as my previous dentist moved and I got quoted $1512 for root canal therapy on a tooth that was confirmed through multiple methods (including a voltage method that tested nerve sensitivity) to be as dead as my previous tooth had been and to be the culprit of the abscess in my jaw that was giving me the pain.

The $1512 includes both the therapy procedure and the filling procedure and materials using Endocal 10/Biocalex versus the more typical gutta percha from a dentist who has 29 years of dental experience and many of them with using Endocal 10 successfully.

Initially, I had gone to him for a free new-patient consultation where he examined my teeth and gums very thoroughly and then took 18 digital x-rays of all of my teeth and then would have me back in his office for a second visit (still free) for the actual consultation of what things he saw and what work, if any, he would suggest.

I had mentioned the pain and my previous history and during the initial examination (not looking at x-rays), nothing presented itself. I was about to leave his office when he stopped me and asked me to step back into the examining room where he tested my teeth’s nerve sensitivities (without me knowing what he was doing) and confirmed that the tooth I had complained about was indeed quite dead (wanted to make sure that he could test my teeth without worrying about a false positive reaction from me from pain from something unrelated to that particular tooth) and then showed me that the x-rays showed the abscess in my jaw connected to my otherwise perfectly fine tooth.

I went ahead and started the first half of the therapy and will be going back to him to have a subsequent look-over to make sure everything is progressing as it should before it will be carefully filled.

After the lengths my dentist went to examine my teeth and then to test them (without my knowing) for proof of living or dead nerve tissue and then to explain and demonstrate to me (as if I didn’t know already the abscess was causing the pain, but whatever; at least he bothered to explain!) the death of the tooth and the resulting need for root canal therapy if I wanted to “save” my natural tooth…

After experiencing relief from that pressure and pain from having the root canal therapy done…

After 8-10 years of no problems with a root canal-ed tooth that has been confirmed on multiple occasions by different dentists…

It makes me sad to think that root canals are being thought of as money making schemes with little to no regard for what they can (or sometimes, can’t) do for a patient who is indeed suffering from a problem like mine – sudden tooth death of a perfectly otherwise healthy tooth with no probable cause which has caused the dead nerve cells to leak into the end of the root and into the bone and causing an abscess to form which then can cause severely excruciating pain.

It also makes me sad to think that my own dentist might be thinking the same way as some of these dentists are – looking at my pain and my problematic tooth as a money making device with little to no regard to me as a patient and a person.

Yeah.

If anyone ever wondered WHY people are so terrified and/or fed up with dentists, THIS blog post is a great example of why!

You are very arrogant. What makes you think that dentists in Mexico or Thailand aren’t as good as those here?

my wife is in manila now getting r/c procedure. she said…the dentist, (described like the way you described yours) is charging $500/25,000php. So, that is $180 more than what your dentist charged. I imagine that the tooth involved has more than one canal. (it better!!) However, it is still about half of what it would cost in the states. Still, I expected the cost to be more in line with what you paid. Also, her dentist is a general dentist…and NOT an endodontist….so, again I feel my wife is being overcharged, but what can I do. I am here in the states and she is there…..
I lived in Cebu for a year and loved it.

I had a root canal on a lower molar about 3 years ago after being referred to an endodontist (in the Allison Park area of Pittsburgh, PA) by my regular dentist. I dind’t really care what the cost was because it hurt so much at the time. I was pleasantly surprised when the endodontist simply accepted the $800 or so covered by my dental plan and didn’t charge me any more.

I now need another root canal in another lower molar (tooth #19, actually) and I’m going back to the same endodontist. I wonder if he still accepts the default insurance coverage, but I guess I’ll find out.

Fortunately my dentist is a college friend, but all of the other dentists I’ve known seem to be pretty decent guys. The concept of a “Wealthy Dentist” blog is somewhat disturbing though.

My son is getting a root canal. Three step process the first step (today) get rid of thespian and start antibiotics. He goes back in 10 days to have “posts” done and then a week or so later he will get the crown. Total cost 1 molar $2024 my cost because I have insurance is almost $1100. Seems very expensive but I don’t want him to lose the tooth. He had a tooth ache about a month ago for one day and then pain went away. The pain came back last night with a vengeance.

It must be a supply and demand thing. Whatever the market is willing to pay.

Just got quoted $3,000 for a first molar, bottom, left side. The dentist automatically knocked it down to $1657 when he heard I didn’t have insurance (and I think he took pity on a single mom with three young children sitting 10 feet away during my treatment). He’s letting me pay this down in installments, $275 per treatment session (3 sessions) and then after that it’s to be $104 a month for 8 months. This is still nowhere near cheap but it is what it is and I’ll just be glad to be out of pain.

you should have stayed in india, Your the problem with America, always’s looking for the cheapest
way. Buy American,shop american/local.
Suppor,t your local grocery store,check the tags,pay alittle more.
STOP BEING SO CHEAP AND SPEND SOME MONEY.