okay, the place itself IS nice, clean, good pricey equipment, etc. but the office itself & what is done & not done is a different story. keep in mind that throughout my life i have gone to some really stellar places w/amazing dentists: see Dr. Mellert in Torrance as one example. so, i know dentists is my point & i'm very observant.
so, my insurance covered this place, for most things, not for really pricey things, like crowns for example. so i went.
1st let me say i have never been to such a QUIET dentist's office in my entire life. i'm not saying they are all loud or noisy, not at all, nor should they be SO quiet, like a library or a mausoleum. so quiet that NO ONE there even greets you, says hello, nothing. no small talk, no how are you, nada. zilch. the dentist doesn't speak to u AT ALL! english is not his first language obviously but he should at least speak to his patients. i got a few words out of him, mostly his staff tells u what he says. it's weird. the silence.
secondly, he told me that i needed (had to have, was urgent) a number of pricey things done. that i needed to cap my 4 front teeth (that they all had cavities & that was the only way to fix them), that i had other cavities elsewhere & needed a root canal. shockingly, almost all things that were NOT covered by my insurance! can u imagine? what a nice coincidence for him. thousands of dollars of work, all from MY pocket.
well, i took that advice & went to my non-insurance covered amazing Dr. Mellert who had been my dentist for yrs when i had no insurance, for a 2nd opinion (& believe me, u need 1 more than u think u do in many cases!) & he told me NONE of that stuff was needed or even warranted! what a crock! what a con! my front teeth (all-natural still yr later now) are still perfectly good & fine.
no cavities. Dr Mellert made me a killer deal & did the root canal that i did need. not sure if it was the 1 the amazing Dr. Park had told me I needed. If I recall correctly, it was a totally different tooth.
so, no bueno obviously.
Let's move onto the piece de resistance, shall we? The should be famous TEETH CLEANING! ok, we've all had numerous teeth cleanings in our lives, right? at 1 or more dental offices. myself as well, in a handful of dentists' offices in my life thus far. this one was a whole new ball of wax for me & i bet almost everyone else out there (unless they had been seeing him & him only for ages). my teeth cleaning, which is what i MADE my appointment for took place in FOUR DIFFERENT APPOINTMENTS!! FOUR!! i'm not kidding here. the 1st was my 1st visit, when i was told no i had to have an exam & all of the x-rays first. more $$ to spend of course, insurance or no. THEN my cleaning had to be split into 2 parts according to them. 1 side of my mouth & then the other. OH, let's not forget that i needed a "SPECIAL, EXTRA DEEP GUM TEETH CLEANING" which i had never had in my life. that i had SO much plaque or whatever under my gums that couldn't be seen by the human eye, or only the dentist's eye, of course. (again, Dr. Mellert (the good dentist said i needed no such thing). i had never had any gum problems or anything beyond a regular cleaning.
i was told that it had to be split into different parts because that's how the insurance did it. ridiculous!
i made my appointments. i went in for my 1st special super deep teeth cleaning appointment & he NUMBED ME! numbed me for a teeth cleaning! have u ever? oh, only 1 half of my mouth too, the left side only, not even top then bottom, no left, then right. just what u want, to run around for a week or 2 w/half of your teeth cleaned, a weird half at that. he then went to work on my mysterious gum stuff. it took him like 10 min or less. was no need of numbing at all (just an extra charge to throw in of course, probably charged for rental of the chair that i was in too & maybe the bib & the mouthwash i swished around then spit out?? haha)
so, 10 min or less, it was really short. i was befuddled. i asked "are u done?" shocked. he said yeah. i said "that's it?" he said "yeah u barely had anything there". haha, barely anything there, after needing a special deep cleaning! of what?
all that was done was the regular scraping that the dental technician does when cleaning your teeth except 5 times shorter & way less intensive! yes, i'm taking the 1/2 mouth only into account too.
2nd appointment same thing. numb, scrape, few minutes, blah blah. done!
THEN onto the polishing! after by far the quickest cleaning of my lifetime, probably the same amount of time i spent in the waiting room, a few mins. "special deep cleaning under the gums" cleaning as well, let's not forget. this was a BIG JOB right? u betcha!
NOW an assistant comes in (btw i've never had an actual dentist do a cleaning before, that's what the dental assistants/teeth cleaning techs are for, but he probably figured since HE has to perform the unnecessary numbing & is only gonna scrape for a few anyway...might as well) & he can charge more mabye? he's the only dentist there too. i digressed. the assistant comes in to do the polishing portion, i'm now thinking "ok this is where i'm going to get my $'s worth". nope. nope nope nope. not even close. she polished my teeth in UNDER 5 MINUTES! my whole mouth, no halfsies this time. i thought she was pausing, going to get more polish or something, but she removed the bib & i was like "what? are u serious? i'm done? where's the rest of the cleaning & polishing & isn't the dentist supposed to now come poke at my teeth w/his tools to look for cavities?" no. all done. he did that on the 1st day w/the countless x-rays & all of the unnecessary dental work recommendations. oh well. i felt robbed. totally ripped off! thank God i wasn't the 1 paying for that whole debacle of appointments, i would have been extra pissed off, i already was pissed off! they made me go thru how many appointments for that joke of a cleaning? AND i didn't even mention how i had to wait extra WEEKS to even get it all started cuz he was out of the country on vacation. yeah, i bet he was. on his yacht, at his private island!
the BEST PART OF ALL was listening to, eavesdropping on any & all of the other patients getting their services while i was there. remember it's like a ghost town, no speaking or sounds at all! except the occasional dental tool. and what i overheard OMG, he was telling EVERY single patient the same exact things he was telling me. same cavities, same new teeth, crowns, special under the gums deep cleaning cleanings. holy s*&t! he was totally out & out conning us all. i peeked at a couple review on here first & saw some others had reached the same conclusions. still more others had all fallen for it & happily went along, paid, God only knows how much unnecessary dental work they've had!
i reported him to my insurance company & the woman that i spoke w/there didn't seem to care at all. she didn't ask for any info, try to escalate it or anything at all. she couldn't have cared less, was completely apathetic. that's not only sad but alarming. i guess she figures she's not paying for it, just her employers, so c'est la vie. & people being preyed upon, having to suffer for it, children too! oh well, no biggie. i don't know who's the worst here, those who prey upon others and/or are complicit or those who don't give a rat's ass about it. all of the above are disturbing to me.
ps. my happy ending. i immediately looked for a new dentist (see my last review prior to this one) & found one like a block away from me & they are wonderful & amazing!! i'm sooo pleased & happy w/them!
*i didn't re-read this or edit it, so any grammar or punctuation mistakes, please forgive.
