Getting Dental Work Done in Mexico: How to Save $1,100 or More

A few of years ago, I was eating lunch at a restaurant in Georgia when I broke a tooth. I went to a dentist in town, who told me that it would cost $750 for a root canal and another $750 for a crown to repair the tooth. Since it did not hurt, I decided to wait, because I knew I would be going to south Texas soon for a job, about eight miles north of the border with Mexico.

Finding a dentist in Mexico is very easy. When I got to McAllen, Texas, I started asking the people I met if they had ever gone to a Mexican dentist, and if so, to whom they went. One dentist in particular was mentioned the most, so I decided to pay him a visit the next week. Dentists Of Mexico is a website that claims to be Mexico's largest dental directory and list dentists by both area of practice and city.

My husband and I drove to the border, parked our truck in the parking lot nearest to the bridge. They charged $1.00 to park there all day. We walked across to the Mexico side of the Rio Grande. The dentist's office was about two blocks over the border.

When I went inside the dentist's office, there were about 20 or so people in the waiting room, most of them Americans. The office was sparking clean, and had the most up to date equipment available. There were 12 dentists working on patients, several assistants, and the front desk staff. All of them were Mexicans, but they all spoke English very well. They did not accept credit cards or insurance, but they did take cash in the form of U.S. dollars, and checks from the United States. However, my friends who have dental insurance in the United States told me that they could file their own claim with their dental insurance for reimbursement.

On my first visit, I did not have an appointment. I just walked in and told the person at the desk I needed to see a dentist. I only had to wait twenty minutes to be seen. The dentist determined that I needed to have a root canal and a crown to repair the broken tooth, and started on the root canal right then. It took three visits to the dentist to complete the work. The subsequent visits were by appointment, and I never had to wait more than five minutes to be seen on those return visits.

The cost of my root canal and porcelain crown in Mexico was a total of $400. That price included prescription pain medications and antibiotics to take home with me. During my stay in Texas, I had three more root canals and crowns done at the same dentist's office. I was charged $400 for each root canal and crown.

Before I left Texas to move back to Georgia, I had six teeth extracted and a partial plate made. The total for the work was $450. This also included all of my pain medication, antibiotics, and the extractions, one of which was a wisdom tooth. The procedure for getting all of that done took the longest of any of the dental work I had done. It took a total of six weeks to have all the teeth extracted, and for making the impressions for my plate.

My husband had a set of porcelain dentures made at the same dentist. His original dentures were made in the United States, were made of acrylic, and cost a total of $1,600. His beautiful porcelain set from Mexico cost only $450, and have been a better fit than the American made ones ever were.

If you are in need of a lot of dental work, you may be able to save money by taking a vacation to Mexico or south Texas to get it done in Mexico. You can ask at the front desk of the hotel or motel where you will be staying for a referral, or at the campground office if you are staying in an RV.

Most Mexican dentists offices are open seven days a week, but for only half a day on Sunday. You will not need an appointment for your first visit. If you are on a short vacation, say only two weeks, be sure to let the dentist who is doing the work know how long you plan to be in the area before he begins, so that he will be able to let you know if he can finish the job in that amount of time.

Once you find a dentist, you can ask for him or her to give you a total of the charges for the services that you need. Sometimes you can negotiate for a better total price if you are having a lot of work done. Most border towns have many dentists' offices in the shopping district near the border, and they advertise their prices for some procedures on signs outside their office. One thing to remember is that they won't clean your teeth or take x-rays unless you ask for them.

Because there are many RV'ers from the northern states who spend two to six months in south Texas and Arizona during the winter, dentists are very busy during that time. The best time to go would be in the late spring, summer, or early fall months, before the snowbirds and Winter Texans arrive or after they leave. Hotels and RV parks have lower rates at those times as well. So, if you need extensive dental work done, having it done in Mexico could save you enough money to pay for your vacation, too! Going to your dentist could turn out to be a great adventure.