What was dental care like in your childhood ?

I just feel SO lucky.
to all who struggled and have awful memories

My grandkids live in South Korea and recently went to the dentist there. They needed a few fillings and when a medieval sort of frame clamped the kids down onto the chair, their Dad said you’re not doing that to my kids and took them home. The dentist said it was normal and couldn’t understand why he was making a fuss! Mind you when I was a dental nurse I often had to sit on patients who had gas.

I am pleased I started this thread as it has affirmed for me the normality of dental experiences in the 1960s and why I have multiple fillings and fear. Unfortunately this has worsened by having an anaphylactic shock to local anaesthetic in a dentist chair in my late 50s. I am now resigned to just waiting for teeth to finally give up and probably drop out. I am not able to have anymore restorative treatment done as unable to have local anaesthetic.
Thank you for all the posts. We all went through hell as children and hopefully the younger generation won't experience.

My dentist in the 50ies was called Mr. Smilie! I remember the horrible gas mask and having a very vivid dream, a bubble car was crashing into the dentist surgery and it landed in the chair where I was sitting,quite terrifying,then a long walk to the bus stop spitting blood all the way! How on earth was this treatment of little kids allowed to go on,makes me shudder thinking back.

I loved my dentist. He was a friend of my family and taught dentistry at the university. He liked to have his practice alongside his professorship and was kind, warm and gentle.

I have terrible teeth in spite of the regular visits to the dentist, the twice-daily tooth-brushing and the fluoride mouthwash (which he prescribed when I was very small and I used till I left home).

My dad's teeth were also awful - looked good (like mine) but very thin enamel- but my mother's were strong and I think she only had one or two fillings in her life. We all went to have our teeth looked after by him.

I was obviously very lucky. He did fill a number of my teeth but always with an injection. He said not to remove a tooth unless you really had no alternative. I don't think I suffered from unnecessary fillings.

This has hit a nerve. I too remember the white caravan at primary school. Then I used to go to a dentist in Edinburgh and the waiting room where you could hear the drill. Fillings without anasthaetic, it was like the scene from Marathon Man 'is it safe?'

I don’t know how it is in the uk but it costs us at least $ 300 as soon as you step through the door of the dentists here. That would be for a small filling. If you have anything complicated it can cost thousands and thousands. We have fluoridated water so we don’t get as many bad teeth as we used to so maybe they are making up for the lack of need. I only go if something is wrong . We do have private health but that only covers about 50 % of it.

Urmstomgran. You’ve got a very good dentist only charging
23.80 for all that. I pay 56.00 for a basic checkup. NHS. Something not right.

sisteract
Am I right in thinking the butcher dentist you mention had a practise in Shoeburyness?

I have been terrified of dentists for as long as I can remember. I have to get my timing just right even now as if I have to wait I start shaking with fear (even though my current dentist is gentle and wonderful and has never hurt me once.
I have a vivid memory of the dentist who gassed me when I was about 7 or 8. He was fat, sweaty and bald with piggy eyes and small round wire NHS glasses. When I cried he shouted at me and told me that if I didn't behave myself he would call my father in and refuse to treat me. I was convinced he was working for Hitler and the gas was going to kill me. I still recall the smell of it and the vision of white lights going round and round above my head as I went to sleep.

Just reading these answers makes my tummy go over. I have true dental phobia. My memories of the dentist are of pain, severe pain. Even as a young adult, the pain was so bad that on at least one occasion I lost consciousness. I learnt much later that not only do I have nerves that are twisted my gums but the roots are too. In addition, just as I've always claimed, the local anaesthetic used in dentistry doesn't work. To add to it all, I have Trigeminal Neuralgia, the vibrations of drills and certain movements are enough to trigger attacks.

So, I no longer have check ups, I wait until things become too painful and am then admitted for dentistry under GA.

I’m another one that ended up with a mouthful of fillings from a dentist in the 60s. She was presumably rubbish as five molars broke in older age. Now have five implants instead. My mouth is worth far more than anything else I own!

Not wanting my children to suffer as I did (see above), when my eldest was tiny I used to give her a little pink fluoride pill, every day with her weetabix. She had her first filling when she was 45. It proved more difficult in France with her two sisters but I tried and they were well into their thirties before their first. (I think it is forbidden) I also made them brush their teeth after every meal, even tea breaks.

My mother took me regularly to the dentist from a very early age. I dreaded it. We always had the earliest appointment in the morning so I missed only the first hour or so of infant school. The first floor waiting room overlooked the street he walked along from the station and my eyes were pinned to the window praying he would have missed his train and wouldn't be coming. He filled all my back teeth, no anaesthetic and afterwards often gave me sixpence for being good - and for a treat spun me round in his office chair. I couldn't bear to hear anyone mention the word dentist - at home I had to go out of the room. When I was about 14 I moved to another dentist - what a difference. My phobia disappeared. Since then I've had only about 4 fillings so obviously all the early ones were unnecessary. I'm really cross that all my back teeth are full of fillings. The DDs in their late thirties and my GDs have no fillings at all.

Have to tell my silly dentist experience: Whilst mum sat in the waiting room, I was considered old enough to go into the treatment room on my own for the first time. At the end of the treatment (I daresay another metal filling) the dentist handed me a glass of water and a pink tablet saying to "put it in here". After a few seconds he peered at the glass of still clear water and asked where the pink tablet was. I'd misunderstood the instruction, and told him in all innocence: I've put it in my ear! Well, I was only 24......

We were part of a trial for fluoride. (free bushes and toothpaste) By the time it started I was about 11 and had several fillings. My brother had none. He has never looked after his teeth but after many decades he finally saw a dentist. Needed NO fillings!
Like many, I had overcrowded teeth but dental experiences had put me off and I didn't get on with my brace. Finally had them straightened when I was in my mid-thirties, full-on braces and all. Best thing I ever did.

Yes rozina. Some of us mention above that we had gas.

WE now now pay per 'course of treatment' rather than per item. So there's no longer any inducement to do two fillings when one would have been sufficient.
But I definitely see pressure to turn a Band 1 'course' (basically a check-up) into a Band 2 one (most procedures short of crowns). And I strongly suspect the dentist bills the NHS more for a Band 2 course that includes a root canal than one that's just a couple of small fillings.

(Yes, you CAN get a root canal job in Band 2 for £62.10. It's when you want a crown put on top of it that it gets expensive.)

I haven't read all of the posts but does no-one remember having gas? I had it each time I went.

Love it MissA! Again.
??

Oh I just remembered that once at primary school (I’m in Scotland) they had a “Happy Smile Club”. We were given a membership card and our parents had to sign each night to say we had brushed our teeth. I can’t remember what the outcome of that was. Does anyone else remember that club?

I can relate to a lot of the posts on here, especially going alone and the gas mask.
The thing that sticks in my mind is being given a tube of smarties at the end of the visit!

I must have been very fortunate as my experience of my dentist, as a child ( I'm
72) wasn't bad at all. I remember being nervous of course but he was always kind and I don't remember having any extractions. As a young mother I used to look forward to going to the dentist just to be able to lie back and put my feet up. I have a lovely dentist now and still enjoy going as we get on well and enjoy a chat. We had one dentist who was actually a friend and once,when he and his wife were with us for a meal, he broke a tooth on my home made granary bread. Needless to say it caused much hilarity with the other guests.

I remember going to the dentist when I was around 10 years old. I had to have some teeth extracted and a horrible rubber mask being clamped over my mouth.
My stepmother never encouraged me to clean my teeth, hence the number of extractions.
I had to have a plate fitted for some front teeth.
As I was approaching puberty I was very embarrassed in case anyone knew.
I can definitely say that my teeth have been ruined by unnecessary fillings, extractions and poor dentistry, even into adulthood I’ve had my teeth messed up.
Unfortunately, I have very few teeth left now and have to wear a metal partial plate.
I would give anything to have a lovely set of real teeth.
Can’t afford veneers and don’t have enough bone structure.

I had to have valium before going to the dentist even as a very young child. Every tooth was drilled and there is something about the slow drill that causes an uncontrollable fear. My rational self tells me that it is no worse than the high speed drill but I don't even have to be sitting in the chair to be affected by the slow drill. I had an abscess on a back tooth at the age of 6 which put me in hospital with meningitis. It was terrifying. I have been left with a long lasting dread of the dentist.