Update

It has been a turbulent year from my end. Lots of changes at work as earlier in the year, the principal dentist and my mentor at the practice I started at suddenly passed away. I stayed on to help the transition after this but have now become the main practitioner at this practice. After building the practice for over 30 years, there was a significant and loyal patient base with a large amount of complex prosthodontic and implant work. As a result, there is a lot of complex work for me to maintain and inevitably a lot of complications and periimplantitis.

Luckily we have arranged for an experienced dentist to come by once or twice a month to take over the larger, more complex cases but I am getting a lot of pressure from the practice to be able to tackle cases beyond my experience. I am trying to quickly upskill to be able to manage some of the more difficult implant and pros cases but it is a very fine line between pushing my boundaries and getting out of my depth. 

I have started some aligner and fixed ortho cases and am planning some straightforward implant cases for placement. I have quickly switched gears from being in a mentored relationship to trying to upskill myself. This has been tricky but to be honest, I am learning more than I would have in a spoonfed mentoring relationship as I am having to do my own research and reading and am learning from multiple experienced clinicians at courses.

Since my last post I have attended a denture course, aligner intro course with OrthoED, implant course with the Australian society of implant dentistry and an introductory course into Concentrated growth factor. Next year I am going to attend a more comprehensive orthodontic course so hopefully will get some more clarity with my fixed ortho and aligner cases.

It has been a challenging past 6 months trying to adjust to the new demands on my both from a career and a personal aspect but I am sensing that there is some stability forming now. The next 6 months will be quite trying but will be massive for my development. I wonder how things will look then.