Dental Insurance For Seniors

Dental insurance for seniors has become increasingly important in recent years as the number of those reaching their golden years with their natural teeth has soared.

Hitting retirement means losing your company dental plan, but you still need regular annual checkups, cleaning, fillings and other regular “maintenance” to keep teeth and gums strong and healthy. It all costs money and getting a good dental plan can really help ease the costs, particularly for those on fixed incomes.

Millions of baby boomers will join the senior ranks in the next decade or so and 75% will have some or all of their own teeth. As recently as the “swinging Sixties” barely 50% of seniors had their own teeth! Indeed, 40 years ago it was assumed the norm that most people would need dentures by the time they reached 60 or 65.

Wrong!

With good dental care – brushing and flossing after meals plus annual checkups – everyone should be able to retain their own teeth into old age. This is important for a couple of reasons: First, once all the teeth are lost the jaw loses bone mass, leading to that shrivelled facial look everyone hates! Second, and more importantly, dentures are no replacement for real teeth because they’re often uncomfortable and feel like they might slip out.

Even if teeth have to be extracted because of decay and disease, many seniors now opt for implants – beautifully fashioned false teeth that screw into posts drilled into the jawbone itself. Bone grows around and anchors these posts and the teeth feel just like the real thing to the patient.

Even seniors who’ve had all their teeth removed can benefit from implants – complete upper and lower dentures can be attached to implant mounts in the jawbone making them as secure as real teeth.

Seniors need to care for their dental health for other reasons, too. For example, some of the many drugs seniors take can result in problems like “dry mouth” in which too little saliva is produced to wash away minute particles of food that can cause decay and gum disease.

Gum diseases and poor dental hygiene can have a more serious impact on overall health as they’ve been linked to heart disease. A severe tooth infection, for example, can result in bacteria that travel through the bloodstream to the heart muscle and heart valves where they can cause serious damage.

What Kind Of Coverage Is Available?

Plans typically offer to cover 50-80% of dental treatment, depending on the procedure. There’s also a maximum annual limit, usually $500-$1,000.

How Do I Get A Dental Plan?

It’s simple – Click here for a free online quote.