What a tooth cleaning costs

For those with statutory insurance, professional tooth cleaning is not a service in the benefits catalogue but a private service. It is billed according to the German scale of dental fees, and per cleaned tooth. That explains the range patients experience between practices and sometimes even between two of their own appointments.

What makes up the amount

Four factors determine the price:

• The number of teeth. A complete set has 28 to 32 teeth. Anyone with gaps pays correspondingly less; implants and crowned teeth are cleaned and counted too.
• The effort per tooth. A lot of tartar, deep grooves, exposed tooth necks and hard-to-reach places cost time.
• The multiplication factor. The scale of fees sets a basic amount for every service, which the practice may multiply by a factor depending on the difficulty. The same action can therefore legitimately cost different amounts.
• Additional services. A fluoride varnish, a staining, a detailed consultation or an anaesthetic can be separate items.

What you may therefore expect: information before the appointment about which services are planned and what amount to expect. For more extensive treatments a written treatment and cost plan is usual. Anyone with supplementary dental insurance needs this plan in any case.

What the statutory health insurer contributes

The statutory insurer does not pay for the cleaning itself. Many insurers do, however, voluntarily grant a contribution — as a statutory benefit, through a bonus programme or on submission of the invoice. How high it is and how often a year it applies is decided by each insurer itself, and the conditions change more often than the scale of fees.

What the insurer does always cover are two neighbouring services that are often confused with the cleaning:

• The removal of tartar above the gum line, once per calendar year. That is considerably less than a complete cleaning — the interdental spaces and the area below the gum line are not included.
• The Examination of the gums every two years, as well as the structured treatment and follow-up care if periodontitis has been diagnosed.

For children and adolescents up to the age of 18 there are additional preventive services of their own that the insurer covers. These include instruction in oral hygiene, fluoridation and the sealing of the permanent molars.

Supplementary dental insurance

Many supplementary policies reimburse the cleaning, often limited to an annual amount or to a certain number of sessions. Three points are regularly decisive and are in the small print:

• Waiting periods after the policy begins.
• Whether the amount applies per calendar year or per policy year.
• Whether a graduated scale applies in the first years that initially limits the amount reimbursed.

For those with private insurance, reimbursement depends on the particular policy. Here too it is worth looking at the annual limit.

Tax and employer

The costs you bear yourself count as extraordinary expenses and can be entered in your income tax return insofar as they exceed your individual reasonable burden. Some employers subsidise prevention as part of occupational health promotion — a look at your own benefits costs nothing.