Paying for your dental treatment: Dental insurance plans.

When comparing, you'll probably find that the financial terms associated with any individual dental insurance plan will probably take one of two basic forms (or possibly a hybrid of both).

» Indemnity dental insurance plans (traditional dental coverage). One is the traditional (indemnity) dental insurance plan where the insured member is reimbursed (either in part or full) for the dental treatment they receive (typically on a fee-for-service basis) from their dentist. (In practice it is usually the dentist who is reimbursed by the insurance company for their services rendered, with the individual insured patient also paying the dentist whatever co-payment is stipulated by the policy.) » Capitation dental health insurance plans. The other type of arrangement that is usually seen with dental health policies is the capitation (pre-paid) dental insurance plan (dental HMO). With this type of coverage the providing dentist contracts with the insurance company to provide that dental treatment that is needed for the plan's enrolled members. The dentist is pre-paid a set amount per member per month (despite the rate of utilization by the policy members), with some types of treatments requiring a co-payment from the patient.

[ Related: Why a dental insurance plan may be difficult for an individual (or individual family) to arrange for on their own. ]

What types of benefits do dental insurance plans usually provide? When comparing individual plans, what should you look (or look out) for?

As you can imagine, the exact financial details associated with any individual dental insurance plan will be different from others. At the same time, however, there are many characteristics that tend to be generic or typical for these types of dental health policies. In regards to evaluating and comparing the suitability of the financial terms of any individual dental health insurance plan, we offer the following information.