Trust

In the past two days, I treated a patient from Washington, DC, San Hosea, CA and Grand Rapids, MI.
Why would these relatively young patients (less than 40) schedule appointments with me when they returned 'home' for the Holidays to see their family?

The answer is simple:

They trust me to treat them right,  have the skill and knowledge and be proficient in my areas of treatment and lastly to have high ethical standards to place their best interest above my own financial concerns.

Patients that select their dentist because they accept their insurance, have low fees and are close to home or work are truly missing out because they will never be able to trust that dentist.

I value my patient's trust more than anything.

I received this email today (December 24) and I thought that I would share it with you.

"Just wanted to say thank you for the gift of the best advice.  I am so happy
with my emerging new smile.
Happy holidays!"

This older patient trusted me sufficiently that when I told her that cutting down her teeth for crowns was not in her best interest and that Invisilign (invisible braces) would be a far better option. My fee would have been $14,000 , earned in less than a month….AND SHE WAS READY TO START TREATMENT. I sat down with this patient and explained that moving her teeth for a beautiful smile was far superior (in this case) to over cutting her teeth for crowns. She trusted me to help her make the right decision even though I would not make a penny treating her.

Why I Use the Rubber Dam

Some of my patients LOVE the rubber dam and a few patients HATE the rubber dam. Every dental student in the United States was trained and required to use a rubber dam in dental school.  95% of practicing dentist give up using the rubber dam once they leave school.

So why do 5% of dentists use a rubber dam?
1. So that they can see what they need to see without  interference from the tongue, lips, cheeks or
    saliva.
2. To place all materials completely dry as required by manufacturers of materials.
3. To prevent injuring the tongue, lips or cheeks
4. To provide a sufficient amount of time to place materials without contamination.

This is a tooth that I fixed today. The reddish/brown mush is tooth decay under a resin (white) filling.
How did the decay get under a new resin filling?
1. Either the dentist could not see the tooth adequately to remove all of the tooth decay or
2. The dentist could not keep the tooth dry enough to adequately bond the new filling to the tooth.

The middle photo shows all the tooth decay removed and the bottom photo shows my completed bonded resin filling.

The more important question is: Why do 95% of dentist refuse to use a rubber dam? There is only one reason:

LAZINESS

Why would anyone select a lazy dentist to take care of them?

Why don't you ask the dentist and THEIR PATIENTS?

My Greatest Accomplishment As A Dentist

I have had many clinical successes and accomplishments during my almost 40 years of practicing dentistry. Last week, Trish, my hygienist saw 10 patients in one day  who had been with me 25-30 years and ranged in age from late 60s to early 80s. Not one of those patients had lost a single tooth while they were under my care.

Our Practiceworks software program has been used in our office for 18 years and it permits me to see every tooth that I have fixed during that time period at a quick glance. A visual survey of each patient showed that I had restored 15- 20 teeth while they have been my patient. A quick look at Practiceworks  
showed that over the last 18 years, I had only restored a few teeth  for this patient group during that time period.

In summary:
1. for most of my long term patients, they have lost very few teeth in the last 25-30 years
2. during the last 18 years, I have fixed very few teeth in this group of patients even though I have fixed almost every tooth in their mouth during the 25-30 year time period.
3. the cost to maintain their teeth for my long term patient has been extremely low considering the length of time that they have been my patient.

Do you understand why I consider this my greatest accomplishment?

Notes of Thanks

Dr. Banchs and I each received a thank you note from the young lady who was kicked in the mouth by a horse on her 19th birthday. It is incredible that the only injury was a severely fractured front tooth.

Dr. Banchs and I worked several hours past our normal hours to do everything possible to  help our young patient keep her front tooth.

It is an honor to be able to treat another human being.

Why I Want to Replace ALL Old Mercury Fillings

Dentists pick and choose which old silver mercury fillings look the worst and need replacing. The fact of the matter is that ALL 20 + year old mercury fillings should be removed and replaced  as conservatively as possible, hopefully with a bonded resin (white) filling using a rubber dam.  Every single old mercury filling has either tooth decay or leakage under the old filling….EVERY SINGLE ONE.

Dentists fool themselves into thinking that ONLY the fillings that they remove have decay underneath.
This is incorrect…ALL of them have tooth decay under the filling.

And if you look very closely at the bottom tooth, you will see a crack in the natural tooth. How does this happen? All metals expand when heated by hot coffee, hot tea or a hot baked potato. Teeth are made of glass and do not want to expand at the same rate as the mercury filling. The result is that the natural tooth develops cracks which cause the tooth to break even when we are only eating a soft egg or soft pasta.

Think about this and ask your dentist to be PROACTIVE and replace all your old mercury fillings. It is a lot cheaper to replace old fillings than to have a mouthful of crowns or porcelain ONLAYS.