Village Dental

WORST OFFICE EVER — DO NOT GO HERE. The receptionist/​office manager is a rude control freak who will make your life a living hell. They will try to get you to do unnecessary work and charge you a fortune for it. They will not honor their contracted rates with their respective network insurance companies even though they are contracted with them. Just the all time worst experiencw EVER.

I love my dentists: both Dr. Schlangs. They have made me feel welcomed every time I come in.

Ok. The crazy part is that Im rating this place with ONE STAR and i didn’t even go. This is what happened:
I called to make an appointment to see why my tooth had been hurting. The receptionist said that given that I have Delta Dental PPO my visit fee will be $ 50. And the services can be negotiated. I was like what? Wait. So you can’t tell me a price for a filling? And she just sounded shady.
After reading the rest of the reviews I decided to not go. I went to Dr. Eric Videgain and my xrays and visit are all covered by my insurance! soooo the receptionist lied to me over the phone about my insurance and the $ 50 visit fee. Wft.

This place is a scam!
I came in for a regular cleaning (which I get religiously every six months) and was told that I needed an inlay for a year old cavity filling.
This sounded beyond fishy, so I went to my regular dentist who said that my teeth were in excellent condition and did not need any type of work.
DO NOT GO HERE.

Well it looks like they were extra careful with me the first time. Stay away from this dental practice at all costs. This is a shady, underhanded, unqualified, and disgusting dental mill. I’m saying this for everybody’s own protection and safety. Don’t come here!!! In fact stay FAR away!

I was suspicious when I was in the waiting area and there was a guy lounging on the next couch playing with his cell phone. When escorted back sure enough that was the dentist. I had forwarded my previous xrays before my appt but the receptionist couldn’t find them. There wasn’t any discussion and the tech proceeded to take xrays of my mouth. When finished I watched Dr Phil for 45 minutes before the dentist was free to exam my mouth and sure enough I needed all kinds of work done costing thousands of dollars including a root canal; what? I have kept up on my dental work my whole life and recently just switched jobs so was looking for a dentist close to work. It was time for a cleaning so that’s why I stopped at Village Dental. And like the rest of these reviews I too was told I needed the «scaling» type cleaning. I know for a fact my gums are in great shape the dentist did not do a gum check and the alarm went off in my head for a 3^rd time. When the receptionist stood by my chair and wanted to setup all these appts I declined. I called my old dentist who said he would be happy to read my new xrays for a second opinion. When I called the receptionist she said she is happy to work with me and it would cost me $ 25 for a copy of my xrays and it will take a week. Oh I will pay the $ 25 and transfer back to my dentist that also knows that Delta Dental gives you a free cleaning once a yr.

I was in this office today. Think twice about coming here if you have a dental HMO plan. I was only able to leave there without shelling out $ because I had read previous Unilocalers, am a physician myself, and have had healthy teeth since my teens with regular dental care from trustworthy dentists.
I have delta dental HMO and a routine cleaning is supposed to be a covered service without copay. Today, after the dentist did the exam, and suggested that I have 5 silver fillings replaced with white amalgam, he sent the office manager in to talk to me. The office manager chose her words carefully so that it sounded like I needed to have the fillings replaced (even though that’s a cosmetic procedure because the fillings are not causing problems), and the fees would only be a co-​pay (it worked out to several hundred dollars). After I declined and told her I just wanted a cleaning, she said that their office policy NO EXCEPTION is to perform an antimicrobial rinse after every cleaning. I know that such rinses are standard of care for deep cleanings below the gumline, but not for routine cleaning like I was supposed to have. The additional fee for this rinse was $ 65. They refused to give me the routine cleaning without the rinse. I left the office having wasted a precious morning off work, gotten x-​rays that I’ll have to pay a fee to duplicate for my next dental visit, and without a cleaning. But at least I kept my $ and didn’t succumb to unnecessary care.

I came here for a cleaning and a dental check up. I was told that all eight of my amalgam fillings needed to be removed and replaced with white composite fillings, in addition to me needing two more fillings. I said that I DID NOT want any of my fillings replaced, merely to give me the two new ones I needed.
So I made another appointment to get these two new fillings. I told them that I had Metlife insurance through the UCLA health insurance plan which they said they work with all the time as they are located in Westwood. I clearly said that I only wanted work done that was covered under the $ 1,000 coverage I had.
I am then taken back to the chair where the dentist comes in and says «ok, let’s replaced those fillings.» I specifically said «No, I did not want to replace my new fillings, just get the two new ones.» He responded, «I’m sorry I spoke wrong.»
Well after I was numbed up and he was drilling away forever he tells me, ok, just sit tight for a while will I let this medication sit on your exposed old fillings that I removed. What?! He still removed them?! I couldn’t even talk to say anything because my mouth was numbed up and full of gauze.
At the end they had the audacity to charge me for the removal and replacement of these fillings that I specifically did not want (not just for cost but for mercury exposure) which was not even covered by my insurance!
DO NOT GO HERE! It’s criminal what they try to get away with!

Went to this practice to check on a sensitive tooth, and after x-​rays was told that a I had severe tooth decay and needed to have a root canal done. Was told the procedure would take 45 minutes but ended up stretching out into a 3 – 4 hour affair because the dentist was bouncing back and forth between me and another patient. This got to the point that tools he left hanging in my mouth were slipping out and falling on to the floor because his assistant was busy working on the other guy to help.
The next day after paying the bill, I called their office asking them to fax a list of the procedures done and their cost. I had to call them four times over the next week, each time they gave some stupid excuse why they couldn’t do it right now and to leave my contact information and they would call me back (never did)
Also during the examination, they said my teeth needed a «deep-​cleaning» and that a tooth needed a filling then tried to scare me by saying they don’t do amalgam fillings because the mercury in them is toxic. I went home a month later and went to see another dentist to have a crown placed on the tooth (the other one only does the expensive porcelain crowns, no metal ones) and was told that while there was some decay a filling was unnecessary and I definitely did not need to have anything more than a regular cleaning done to my teeth.
I give an extra star only because the prices were competitive and there appears to be no apparent issues with actual the work done which despite the shadiness I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt on whether or not it was necessary. It has also been almost two months and no claims have yet been made on my insurance but that’s money they are losing not me.

Shady, shady, shady.
I went in for a «cleaning,» and was told that I needed to spend almost $ 800 dollars for a special scaling and re-​plating procedure, followed by a custom nightguard and an anti-​microbial rinse.
I politely declined. When I flew home a month later, my family dentist who I grew up with laughed at the story, said my teeth were fine, and charged me $ 80 for a normal cleaning.
Basically, they didn’t want to clean my teeth, as covered by my insurance, because they don’t make any money off of it. So, they invented a bunch of scary-​sounding expensive treatments that I *needed* to try and scam me. As Unilocal would say, «Eek! Methinks not.»