What Kids’ Dental Care Costs in Chino Hills — In Actual Dollars

Search for a children’s dentist in Chino Hills and you will find a dozen websites and not one price. We checked. Nobody in this city publishes what a first visit costs, and nobody says whether they take Medi-Cal. You are expected to book, drive over, sit through the appointment, and find out at the front desk what you owe.

This page does it the other way around. Below is what we charge, what your insurance changes, what braces run and what the monthly payment looks like, what wisdom teeth cost per tooth, and — for the things we genuinely cannot price on a web page — exactly how you get a number before anyone touches your child’s teeth.

A first visit, priced three ways

If your child has no dental insurance: free. The exam and the X-rays cost you nothing. Not a coupon, not a first-Tuesday promotion — that is the standing price for an uninsured child. You leave knowing what is going on in your kid’s mouth and what, if anything, needs doing.

If you want the full new-patient visit: $100. Exam, X-rays, cleaning, fluoride. Parents ask how that squares with “free.” Simple: if you only want to know whether there is a problem, take the free exam and X-rays and pay nothing. If you want your child actually cleaned and fluoride-treated on the same trip, that is the $100. You choose at the front desk, not after.

If you have a PPO: we are in-network with most plans, and we verify your specific benefits before you come in. We call your plan, read your child’s remaining annual maximum, and tell you what the visit costs before you take time off work. We do not take HMO plans. If your card says HMO, say so on the phone and we will tell you straight away rather than letting you drive over.

If you have Medi-Cal Dental or IEHP: covered. Details in a section of their own below.

Why almost no dental office will print a price, and what we’ll say anyway

The honest reason offices hide prices is that dentistry is not a menu. A “filling” on a two-year-old’s front tooth and a “filling” on a fourteen-year-old’s molar are different amounts of work, different materials, different time in the chair. Publish one number and half the people who read it get quoted something else in person and feel lied to. So most offices publish nothing, which is worse: it turns every appointment into a negotiation you walk into blind.

Here is the line we draw. Where a price is fixed, we print it — the $100, the free exam, every orthodontic number below, $300 a wisdom tooth. Where a price depends on what we find — fillings, crowns, sedation for a small child — we will not invent a figure to look transparent. What we do instead is put it in writing before anything starts.

The written estimate

Every treatment plan leaves this office on paper, line by line, with a dollar figure next to each line and a total at the bottom. If insurance is involved, the estimate shows what the plan is expected to pay and what your share is. You take it home, think about it, call another office, come back next week. Nothing starts because you felt cornered at the desk.

And if the plan changes mid-treatment — a tooth turns out worse than the X-ray suggested — we stop, tell you, and reprice before continuing. You approve the new number or you do not.

What insurance actually changes — and what it doesn’t

“Covered” is the most misleading word in dentistry. A few things worth knowing before you read your own plan documents:

In-network vs. out-of-network. In-network, the plan has already negotiated the fee down and you pay a share of the reduced amount. Out-of-network, you can still be seen, but you may pay the difference between what we charge and what your plan allows. We are in-network with most PPOs — “most” is doing real work in that sentence, which is why we verify your plan first.

The annual maximum. Most PPO plans cap what they pay per person per calendar year, commonly somewhere around $1,000 to $1,500. Two crowns and a couple of fillings can reach it. Past the cap, you pay the full negotiated fee. If your child needs a lot of work, ask about splitting it across two benefit years — December and January can be worth thousands of dollars to you.

Waiting periods. Some plans will not pay for major work until you have held the policy a set number of months. If you switched jobs recently, this is the one that catches people.

Preventive is the generous part. Cleanings and exams are commonly covered at or near 100%. Fillings and crowns are not. A plan that “covers everything” almost never does.

Medi-Cal Dental and IEHP in Chino Hills

We accept both, and they are closer to the same thing than most people realize. If your card says IEHP, that’s your child’s medical plan; the dental benefit is administered by the state’s Medi-Cal Dental program either way, and we bill it for you. Bring whichever cards you have. Either way you are not on a separate track at this office — same doctors, same rooms, same appointment lengths as a PPO family.

For children under 21, Medi-Cal Dental covers exams and cleanings every six months, X-rays, fluoride varnish, sealants, fillings, crowns, and emergency visits. What it does not cover: orthodontics, except for cases meeting the state’s medical-necessity standard, and Invisalign is not covered at all. If a neighbor told you Medi-Cal pays for braces, that is true only for a narrow band of severe cases, and we will tell you honestly whether your child falls in it.

When sedation is part of the picture

Sedation changes the number, and we will not pretend otherwise. A child who can be talked through a filling awake costs less than one who needs nitrous, who costs less than one who needs IV sedation or general anesthesia. Where sedation is on the table it appears as its own line on your written estimate, with its own price, before you agree to anything.

One factual point, since parents comparing offices will run into it: we have four board-certified dental anesthesiologists on staff — Dr. Charles Lee, Dr. Albert Kang, Dr. Ji Yoon Choi, and Dr. Andrew Elmasri — who work in this building rather than visiting it. That matters clinically more than financially. Full explanation on our sedation page.

Orthodontics: the whole price list

This is where we have hard numbers, so here they are.

• Braces: around $3,500

• Invisalign: around $4,000

• Phase One (early treatment, usually ages 7–10): around $3,000

• Invisalign First: around $3,500

• Complex cases: up to around $4,500

Those are full-treatment prices, not deposits. The consultation is free — you can bring your Ayala or Chino Hills High student in, get an opinion from Dr. Lyndon Tran, a board-certified orthodontist, and leave owing nothing.

The monthly payment is the number most parents actually need. Our in-house plans are 0% interest — no financing company, no credit check drama, no interest stacked on the back end:

• $300 down, then about $133/month for 24 months

• $500 down, then about $146/month for 24 months

• $300 down, then about $150/month for 18 months

• $500 down, then about $167/month for 18 months

More on treatment itself at braces and Invisalign, and there is a Chino Hills orthodontic page at orthodontist and Invisalign in Chino Hills.

Wisdom teeth, for the teenagers

First evaluation belongs at 13 or 14 — not because they come out then, but because that is when the X-ray tells you whether they will have to. Pricing is flat: $300 per tooth, and $1,200 flat for IV sedation or general anesthesia whether it is one tooth or four. A full set of four under general anesthesia is four times $300 plus the single $1,200 — you can do that arithmetic without calling us, which is the point. Dr. Sean Moghadam, a board-certified oral and maxillofacial surgeon, does these in the same building. More at wisdom tooth extraction.

When the number is still too high

Sometimes the estimate is honest, itemized, correctly insured — and still more than you have this month. Here is what is actually available:

CareCredit. Outside financing with interest-free promotional windows if you pay within the term. We accept it.

5% off for paying in full in cash. And it stacks — you can put part of a treatment plan on CareCredit and still take the cash discount on the portion you pay outright.

Phasing by urgency. Most families don’t know to ask for this. An abscess or a tooth causing pain is not negotiable and gets handled now — see emergencies. A small cavity in a baby tooth that will fall out in eight months may be watchable. A sealant can wait a quarter. We’ll go down your estimate and mark what has to happen now, what can happen in three months, and what can wait for the next benefit year. Most offices will do this if you ask; almost none offer.

Precios claros para su hijo, en español

En esta oficina hablamos español — en la recepción, con el dentista, y mientras su hijo está en el sillón. Si usted vive en Chino Hills y no tiene seguro dental, el examen y las radiografías de su niño no cuestan nada. La visita completa de paciente nuevo, con limpieza y flúor, cuesta $100.

Aceptamos Medi-Cal Dental e IEHP, y Chino Hills está en el condado de San Bernardino, así que IEHP sí aplica aquí. También aceptamos la mayoría de los planes PPO, pero no aceptamos planes HMO.

Antes de empezar cualquier tratamiento, usted recibe un presupuesto escrito, línea por línea, con el precio de cada cosa. Se lo lleva a casa. Nadie empieza nada sin su permiso y sin que usted sepa el costo.

Si su familia habla otro idioma en casa — y en Chino Hills eso es muy común — puede traer a alguien que le interprete, sin problema, y el plan de tratamiento escrito se va a casa con usted para que lo revise con calma. Nuestros anestesiólogos dentales hablan mandarín, cantonés, coreano y vietnamita, y están en la oficina los días de sedación.

Llame al 909-741-7052.

Getting here from Chino Hills, and where we are

Kids Dental Castle & Orthodontics

1532 San Bernardino Ave #A1, Pomona, CA 91767

909-741-7052

Monday–Friday 9–6 · Saturday 8–2

From most of Chino Hills the drive is the 71. Pick it up wherever you normally do — Chino Hills Parkway, Grand Avenue, or Carbon Canyon Road if you are on the west side near the state park — and head north. The 71 runs up the eastern edge of the city, crosses the 60 in Pomona, and ends at the 10. A few minutes east from there, off at Garey Avenue. Figure roughly 20 to 25 minutes from The Shoppes, longer at 5 p.m. on a weekday, which is why we hold Saturday hours 8 to 2.

One note on paperwork: Chino Hills and Chino are two different cities, even though Chino Valley Unified serves both. If your address says Chino Hills, you are in San Bernardino County and IEHP applies. We also see families from Chino, Diamond Bar, Brea, and Yorba Linda; there is a separate page for Chino families.

The phone is answered 6 a.m. to 9 p.m., seven days a week, and same-day emergency slots are held Monday through Saturday. General information at pediatric dentistry and our contact page.

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