In 2000 I was in Romania for a conference at the resort town of Braşov. I was eating supper and surprised by something crunchy. It turned out to be a piece of my tooth. It had broken off down to the gum line. I could imagine the pain I might have on the plane trip back home as they pressurized the cabin. I had to get it taken care of, but I was a continent away from my dentist. So I asked several people on the street about a dentist. When I got a dentist’s name twice, I figured he must be good, so went to his office. But the dentist didn’t speak English. A local ski instructor who spoke a little English was in the waiting room and explained my situation to the dentist. So the dentist called a taxi and sent me to get an x-ray at another office. The x-ray office was one room with everyone sitting around waiting their turn at the seat in the middle. No secure room; no lead shield; nothing. The cost was 4,000 lei – about 12¢. When I returned with the x-ray, the dentist explained that I needed a root canal. He drilled out my tooth, extracted the nerve, and packed the cavity with antibiotic soaked gauze. I had to return in two days. At the next session, he cleaned out the tooth canal and installed a titanium post that would hold the new crown. He finished the crown in about an hour. The total cost for root canal and crown build-up was $58!
