The price of a dental crown can vary dramatically from state to state and city to city. If you want to figure out exactly how much you’ll pay for a dental crown, then you need to take a look at the specific facts for your city. However, that isn’t necessarily enough if you want to get a good idea of where the price will be in a few months or years. You’ll need to evaluate a variety of factors and identify what’s in your budget and what isn’t. To help you plan out your dental health in 2020, here’s a breakdown of dental crown cost in Los Angeles.
Factors to Consider
In broad strokes, you need to understand how crowns are made. Not all crowns are made the same, which has an obvious impact on how much you pay. Better and longer-lasting materials tend to cost more, but you also need to take the location of the crown into consideration. Where it will be placed in your mouth will have some impact on which material is chosen.
Don’t worry too much though because you don’t necessarily have to make this decision yourself. A skilled cosmetic dentist will be able to tell you what material is best for your circumstances. This is one reason among many why you want to pick a great cosmetic dentist that has the experience needed for the job. If you pick any old dentist, they could give you a material that is less than ideal, leading to significant problems down the road.
The Impact of Materials
There are five major materials that you should be aware of. They aren’t equally popular, but it’s good to know what options are out there.
Gold
Immortalized in popular culture as the crown of choice for prospectors and pirates, gold has been used in crowns for a long time. It offers a lot of advantages, including excellent durability, low reactivity, and minimal discomfort for your other teeth. When considered together, these make gold an excellent choice for molars. They can grind down food for decades, plus they won’t need replacement anytime soon. Of course, gold isn’t the perfect choice for every situation. Gold does tend to be the most expensive option for fairly obvious reasons, plus it’s a little too flashy for front teeth. It’s rare, but some people have gold allergies, so you’ll certainly want to get that tested before committing to gold.
Porcelain
To contrast with how completely gold stands out, porcelain looks so natural that nobody will be able to tell you even have a crown. If you need to get one of your front and center teeth crowned, then porcelain is the best way to make sure that nobody will be able to tell the difference. Of course, that does come at a fairly steep cost. Porcelain isn’t as expensive as gold, but it’s still a fair bit pricier than other options. Porcelain can also require some sculpting and reduction in your tooth in order to accommodate the new crown, so if your teeth aren’t in any condition to allow for that, you may want to look elsewhere.
Porcelain fused to metal
At the cheaper end of the spectrum, you can get a crown that’s made of porcelain and metal. These combination pieces don’t look nearly as natural, but for people that are looking to crown a tooth near the back, that won’t make much of a difference. Compared to gold crowns that would be competing for those molars, fused porcelain crowns are cheaper, with the tradeoff being that they won’t last as long and they might be a bit more uncomfortable.
Dental composite
Finally, you’ve got dental composite crowns, which are generally the cheapest option. If you want to get a crown and pay the least amount possible, then a composite filling is a good choice. However, they won’t last all that long, so you may need to get a replacement within the next few years. The cost of constant replacement can quickly add up over the years, not to mention the lowered level of comfort due to the crown wearing down quickly. Of course, for people that are sensitive to gold and porcelain, dental composite may be one of the few viable options.
The Influence of Dental Laboratories
One key fact about crowns is that they aren’t made by your dentist. Instead, your dentist will take your measurements and have a specialized laboratory make the crown itself, then that gets sent to your dentist and they place it in your mouth.
The important consideration here is that not every laboratory has the same prices. Some may charge more and some may charge less relative to the norm in the area. Two dentists a block apart may have very different rates for crowns because they use different laboratories. Don’t just look at one local dentist and conclude that their pricing is the same as everyone else’s.
Dental Crown Cost in Los Angeles
Overall, the price of a crown can range from $800 to $3000. However, a lot of that will come down to which dentist you use, what kind of material you get, where the tooth is in your mouth, the state of the tooth, and whether you have insurance.
[See: Root Canal and Crown Cost]
How Insurance Can Help with Dental Crown Cost
Generally, insurance can cut a few hundred dollars off the price tag. If the crown would have cost $1200 without insurance (a reasonable price for a standard porcelain crown), then your bill with insurance may be somewhere around $800-900.
If you need to get multiple crowns, then it’s pretty easy to see how the savings can really add up. On top of that, remember that your insurance will likely also cover some of the regular appointment fees, cleaning fees, and any dental work that needs to be done in preparation for the crown. Monthly premiums may seem high on their own, but when they’re saving hundreds and hundreds, the benefits speak for themselves.
The Bottom Line
There are a lot of factors that go into how much a crown costs. Speak to your dentist and figure out what would be best for your situation. Insurance can come in very handy, so if you’re not insured now, it would be a good idea to get insurance in case you have more dental problems in the future.
