Can organised dental care for children be both good and cheap?
Children’s dental services evolved from emergency, pain-relieving and later amalgam-based care systems of the early and middle 20th century. The pattern of occurrence of dental caries is different today and young teenagers have very few teeth affected by caries. Restoration of lesions in permanent teeth, typically on occlusal or buccal/lingual surfaces, is technically simple. Paradoxically, dental students today are expected to master a vast amount of knowledge, including information on new dental materials and techniques. New dentists who choose to provide dental care for children as a career will spend most of their days placing fissure sealants, applying topical fluorides and inserting predominantly single-surface restorations. Because of their expensive training, new dentists will nevertheless expect high earnings, and this results in a high cost for children’s dental care. The opportunity cost is other health services foregone. In developing countries where there are few dentists,
