Hubby went to the dentist for his checkup a while back and had a cavity that needed filling. We got a bill in the mail for $93.75, which is our share. I need to call our dental insurance to confirm it because it seems a bit high to me. His checkup was fully covered, so I'm assuming this is the $25 annual deductible plus 20% of the total but the math didn't work out.

But here's the kicker. While he was getting the filling done, the dentist saw that he had a cracked tooth and suggested hubby make an appointment to have it taken care of. Hubby knew the tooth was cracked, but never did anything about it because it never bothered him. He decided to make the appointment and get it taken care of.

Turns out the dentist put the equivalent of a crown on his tooth. As someone with a small fortune of work in my mouth (I told my dentist I wanted to go to his kid's college graduation because I feel like I foot the bill!), I have no objection to what his dentist did; that's how they take care of cracked teeth. However, hubby didn't realize until after the fact that the cost of a crown is $1000! (Again, that's in line with what my dentist charges so I'm not shocked at the number). Our insurance will only cover half, meaning that we have to pay $500!

So on the one hand, I feel like the dentist was just doing his job, and if the work needed to be done it needed to be done, so we just need to suck it up. On the other hand, spending $500 to fix a tooth that wasn't even bothering him in the first place is disappointing, to say the least. I feel like I was duped, but it's our own fault. Adding salt to my wound is the fact that we only have about $125 left in our medical FSA for the year, so that doesn't even fully cover it, and it's just a bad month (aren't they all?) with everything else going on.

Let the buyer beware...even (especially?) with doctors...