Madam, – Imagine you are suffering from a disease and the Health Service Executive (HSE) one day decides it is not going to pay to treat this disease any more because it wants to save money. Would you believe it? No. What could you do? Nothing.
This is the reality for people who can least afford to pay for treatment and so their disease will continue untreated. But a disease left untreated, that is scandalous? Is it cancer? No. It is gum disease. But before you turn away from this page gum disease has been linked to cancer and if you are over 35 years old there is a 90 per cent chance that you too, have this disease.
Gum disease is the most common disease in the Irish population and thanks to new cuts announced on Thursday by the HSE more than a 1.5 million Irish citizens with medical cards can no longer access treatment for this disease. To suspend treatment for a disease which is linked to a “higher chance of lung, kidney, pancreatic and blood cancers” (Imperial College London, the Lancet. BBC News May 26th, 2008) is, in my opinion, medical negligence.
To suspend treatment for a disease which affects nearly all medical card patients over the age of 30 attending the above practice is, in my opinion, dental negligence. And to suspend treatment for a disease which their own HSE web page says causes “bad breath”, “swollen red”, “tender and painful gums” and then advises that you should “visit your dentist regularly” is the height of hypocrisy.
Visit the dentist for what? So he can tell you that you have a disease which is linked to cancer and without treatment you will likely lose your teeth one by one until soon enough you will need dentures. Well, not this dentist.
As a dental practice we feel negligence deserves compensation. Therefore for every medical card patient who visits us we will carry out a detailed diagnosis of their gum situation so that the patient can inform the HSÉ should their disease continue to go untreated they will be seeking compensation.
Measuring people’s health and wellbeing in terms of monetary value can be a double-edged sword. – Yours, etc,