Perhaps you recently moved to a new neighborhood, or are simply not happy with your current dentist - whatever your reason for wanting a new dentist, consider the following first. While all dentists go through rigorous training to become qualified, that simply ensures that each is capable of a minimum level of care. Since the dental field is a rapidly evolving one, some dentists keep up with advances, while others may continue to use practices no longer promoted by experts. Furthermore, some are simply more inept at what they do and provide a better level of care. Use the following guide to find those dentists: 

Wrong things to consider: cost

Far too often, patients choose their dentist for the wrong reasons. Most patients search for the dentist offering the lowest fees, assuming that all dental work is the same. Unfortunately, the spectrum of dental care varies widely, and too often, low cost equates to lower quality dental materials. Patients only realise this error when their dental appliance or filling fails and requires constant replacement. Incidentally, a dentist who charges a large fee does not necessarily provide greater dental care. As a rule of thumb, consider all other factors first, and factor costs into the equation at the very end.

Advertising

Another common mistake is to choose the dentist with the flashiest advertisements. While many patients are wary of normal product advertising, they let their guard down when it comes to dentists advertising professional services. Be careful of any advertising claims made - they can be misleading and expected results may be exadurated. Never base your decision regarding a dentist on the results you see on his or her advertisements - most display best case scenarios for promotional reasons.

Personality

The final "wrong" reason for choosing a dentist runs counter-intuitive to most people's instincts. Try to avoid choosing a dentist based on his or her personality. While avoiding hostile, rude, or unprofessional dentists is essential, siding with a practitioner simply because they have a great presonality can be equally harmful. The quality of dental work varies with each dentist's knowledge and motor dextirity - a winning personality tells you nothing about either. Find a dentist with a professional attitude, but becoming good friends is not a requirement for good oral health treatment.

Right things to consider

So how do you find out which dentists in your area are above their peers? The key is to ask other health professionals that work alongside dentists, but whom hold no vested interest. Begin with asking local pharmacists or family physicians for recommendations. Dentists are in constant contact with these professions, and most can at the very least, let you which dentists to avoid. 

If you live in a well populated area, it is worthwhile to go to the next step and contact the local dental school or dental labratory for their opinion. Most dental schools are learning institutions and gain nothing from making recommendations. In fact, dental educators know the abilities of previous graduates and excellent recommendations can be acquired in this manner. Alternatively, you may look up a few dental labratories in the yellow pages and ask them for recommendations. 

Labratories are businesses where dentists send impressions of your teeth so that devices such as bridges, dentures and veneers can be manufactured. Since they receive work from many different dentists, they can judge the manual dexterity of various dentists against one another. Unlike dental schools though, dental labratories are private enterprises and may try to push the dentist sending them the most amount of work - so always ask for several recommendations and not just one.

Contacting dental specialists is likely the best way to enquire about the skills of local dentists. Some dental specialists such as periodontists, endodontists and orthodontists interact closely with general dentists and have indepth personal knowledge of the abilities of specific practitioners. Staff persons in most specialist offices are pleased to recommend a few names of general practitioners close to you, and they are likely to be very good suggestions.

This site's recommendation is to call several of these different sources, get 2-3 of their top recommendations, and see which names re-appear on separate lists. From there, you are ready to visit the dentist and actually assess them in person, knowing that at least their peers respect the quality of their work.

Final things to consider

During your first introductory meeting with the dentist, inquire about the following to see if the dentist is a good fit for you.

• how long the practice has been in operation - a long running practice suggests patients are happy to return and that the dentist holds experience
   
• if emergency care is provided on weekends or after hours - you do not want to learn that the office is closed when you develop that toothache
   
• whether the dentist is part of any dental socities - many organizations request that their members attend meetings and stay up-to-date in order to retain membership

• if he/she uses loupes (glasses which have magnification lenses attached) during restorative work - magnification catches errors beyond the capabilties of the unaided eye

Finally, if you are interested in a particular procedure (say orthodontic work), enquire about the dentist's experience with that particular procedure. No dentist is great at everything - the best dentists are those which are willing to refer you to someone else when the work required is beyond their scope of expertese.

While the above may be time consuming, finding a quality dentist is well worth the effort. Poor dental treatment ends up costing you considerably more in pain, cost and time - not to mention the final result may not function or be as aesthetic as you were hoping.