Dentistry Throughout The World - United States

United States

In the United States dentistry is generally practiced by dentists who have completed a post-graduate course of professional education. With exception of rural Alaska, Dental therapists are not permitted to practice in the United States. Use of dental therapists, dental health aids, or dental hygienists to independently perform routine fillings or cleaning is strongly opposed by the American Dental Association, (the A.D.A.), the dentists' professional association. This has resulted in excellent but high-priced treatment which, however, fails to delivers services at a reasonable price to the lower social classes. With only a few exceptions, neither government-sponsored health care programs such as Medicare nor Medicaid cover routine dental treatment. As a result large sections of the population do without. The worst conditions are in Kentucky and West Virginia.

Rates for dental services have been rising rapidly, out pacing the rate of inflation. After falling for many years, the percentage of both adults and children with unfilled cavities began to rise in 2000 as did the percentage of adults with no teeth. Increasingly, people with adequate income to pay the fees are forgoing treatment.

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Famous quotes related to united states:

    United States! the ages plead,—
    Present and Past in under-song,—
    Go put your creed into your deed,—
    Nor speak with double tongue.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    Then the American flag was saluted. In general, in the United States people always salute the American flag.
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    The men the American people admire most extravagantly are the most daring liars; the men they detest most violently are those who try to tell them the truth. A Galileo could no more be elected President of the United States than he could be elected Pope of Rome. Both posts are reserved for men favored by God with an extraordinary genius for swathing the bitter facts of life in bandages of soft illusion.
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    Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)

    In the United States all business not transacted over the telephone is accomplished in conjunction with alcohol or food, often under conditions of advanced intoxication. This is a fact of the utmost importance for the visitor of limited funds ... for it means that the most expensive restaurants are, with rare exceptions, the worst.
    John Kenneth Galbraith (b. 1908)