Amateur ground teeth for gold caps

DITA DE BONI

A man who ground down people's teeth in his lounge so he could fit gold caps has been fined $2500 with $990 court costs.

Touanga Moala, a Tongan in New Zealand on a visitor's permit, was convicted and fined in the Manukau District Court for practising dentistry without registration after his work caught the eye of the Ministry of Health.

The practice of grinding down healthy teeth and adding gold caps for cosmetic purposes is frowned on by the ministry, especially when the procedure is done by an unregistered practitioner working in non-sterile conditions.

Director of Public Health Dr Colin Tukuitonga said the court was told that anyone treated by Moala ran a significant risk of infection, costly remedial work or even removal of diseased teeth. The ministry said it was aware of cases where people treated by Moala lost poorly fitted caps, suffered discoloured teeth from subsequent infection or had their treated teeth removed when infection had spread too far.

Dr Tukuitonga said the ministry took these issues very seriously.