tips and tricks

 I'm continuing the theme of photography and records with this post with a few of the most common photography errors that I have made and learned from, but still make from time to time. These errors may harm the diagnostic quality of the photos. If we are going to the effort of capturing the photos in the first place it is important that we try our best to make them the best quality and as useful as they can be.  I made a post previously about some basic camera settings which may be useful for complete camera newbies: https://dental-tidbits.blogspot.com/2020/04/basics-of-photography.html  Buccal shots should be perpendicular to the teeth   This is one I learned at the Orthoed Minimasters. For orthodontically diagnostic images, the buccal shots must show the canine and molar relationship accurately. This means that the photos should be taken perpendicular to the posterior plane of occlusion. Most commonly, the buccal shots are taken angled from the anterior as we...

 I have been doing more stainless steel crowns this year. In fact, prior to 3 months ago I hadn't done one at all. We learned about them briefly during the pediatric dentistry lectures at university and I attended a course on stainless steel crowns and pulpotomies at ADAQ as a new graduate. However I was always put off from doing them, partly because of my percieved complexity of the procedure as well as my stubbornness to change the way I do things. I thought that because I had more experience with doing composite resin fillings, that would be the way to go. Actually, I have always found appointments with kids quite intimidating. I have done a fair few fillings on kids over the years, some successful and I am sure a lot unsuccessful. When undertaking procedures that intimidate us, we tend to hesitate from going all the way with the procedure. Essentially this means that things aren't done properly. I was afraid to give local anaesthetic to kids, so I was afraid to prep the car...

 I was going to make a post on caries detector dye because I find it to be such a useful aid during restorative procedures. Then I realised I had already made a post about in 2020. See below. https://dental-tidbits.blogspot.com/2020/09/a-note-on-caries-detector-dye.html  I pretty much agree with my thoughts on the previous post. At the time in 2020 I was using the dye fairly regularly as they had it at the public clinic I was at. I think my use dropped off as I transitioned to private practice and not every clinic I worked at had access to it. Now if I worked at a clinic without access to caries detector dye it would be something I would be requesting or purchasing myself.  Not that I need it to practice, no one needs it, but using it regularly will assist in consistency of your restorations. For proper adhesion to tooth structure, you must ensure that you are bonding to sound enamel and dentine. Therefore caries must be removed to an acceptable standard, clean margins ar...

For some reason, I had a long period of no denture cases coming in. For maybe 1-2 years I did a couple of fractured denture repairs but no new denture cases. Lately there have been some new ones coming in which have been enjoyable to work with. I thought I would make a post regarding modification vs remaking of dentures. Of course by modification I don't mean something simple like adjusting a denture sore spot, where we obviously wouldn't remake a denture, but for where there is a significant discrepancy between what the denture should be like and what it is like e.g changes to the fit or teeth. One common dilemma when a patient comes in with an old set of dentures is do we do nothing, do we try to improve the current denture, or do we start again and create a new set for the patient. My take on this is simple, if I can make an improvement to their current denture and this improvement will make a significant difference to the patient then it is justifiable to do something for t...

 I have been taking a standardised set of clinical photos for my patients for a few years now. Mainly for new patients or existing patients to the practice which I am meeting for the first time if they have something that requires in depth discussion. I find this to be hugely useful in communication and patient acceptance of their condition. I will try to go through my approach to photography in future posts but I mainly wanted to show the set of photos that I take on a daily basis. My photos aren't perfect, there are some things I would like to start doing when I can be bothered, like paying attention to the magnification ratios on the lens to standardise my photos more. However my photography has improved a lot since I started to play around with it back at dental school. Basic new patient photo set in sequence:  Close up smile Retracted frontal Retracted frontal half open Retracted right buccal in occlusion  Retracted right buccal half open Retracted left buccal in occ...

I recently completed the last module of the Orthoed MiniMasters run by Dr. Geoff Hall. An orthodontist based in Melbourne. I thought the course was well run and a good starting point for someone who is inexperienced in orthodontics. The progression of the courses weren't difficult to follow, basics at the start and more complicated concepts built on top of those basics. He is big on fundementals and concepts and I think an important aspect of the course is identifying risk and mitigating risk in orthodontics.  There were a few concepts that I took from the course and have unconsciously been applying to other aspects of dentistry namely: - There are no problems, only solutions. When we are faced with a problem, think of every possible solution to that problem no matter how farfetched and then think of the benefit and risk of each of those solutions. Sometimes one solution to a problem will create other problems and that needs to be accounted for. For example, For a crowding issue, o...

Last year I attended a lecture by Michael Sernik who founded Prime practice but subsequently separated from the company. Then later that year I attended a prime practice seminar on communication and case acceptance. I took away a few things from those talks and I find my communication style to have been altered because of it. To be honest, before those talks, I didn't really have a communication style. I kind of just blurted out the facts and then it was up to luck whether or not the patient accepted my plan or not. Usually they would accept it if they already know of the preexisting situation and options. After the talks, I have been focusing more on educating the patient as to their preexisting condition, and focusing on the DREC (which they call the- Damaging results of the existing condition). I have found this to be helpful in getting patients to understand their situation and to be honest it matches well with how I actually  want  to communicate with patients. I am not t...

 I haven't made a post here in almost two years. I've been really busy with life, started a family, been working a lot. It's not that I had no time to post anything, it doesn't take that long. It's just that there have been so many other priorities that I had an let's be honest, I am a strong procrastinator. From a professional standpoint, I'll reflect as to where I am in my journey. I keep forgetting when I graduated, some patients ask me how long I have been a dentist and I have to calculate the years in my head. I get it less and less these days, but still so because I have a young face (at least I think I do). I graduated end of 2016 so that makes it (...2017, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25) my 9th year as a dentist. I know that some of my colleagues have expanded their skills much faster than me, and I know that some have developed much slower and are pretty much where they were when they graduated, just working a bit faster at producing the same type a...