Class III's

Both my patients on Tuesday were Class III's, and I didn't miss any spots!! Now I only need 3 more quads of a Class III to finish those requirements. I also had my husband come in so I could practice injections since he's going to be my Anesthesia Board patient. He said he felt a ZING when I did the IA so I was pretty excited that I hit the nerve right on. He wasn't too happy about it because he was numb for about 4 hours and I had told him he wouldn't be because I was barely depositing any solution. He had great landmarks so I was way excited about that!!

What a Week!

This has been a crazy busy week for me. Class on Monday, Mockboards on Tuesday, National Board Exam on Wednesday, VA on Thursday, Sealant Clinic on Friday, work on Saturday. I am really looking forward to having Monday off!!

I didn't do great on Mockboards, but suprisingly I still feel pretty good about Boards coming up. I missed 3 spots in the UL quad, and I'm submitting the UR quad on the same patient for real boards. I feel really comfortable with this patient and I'm so glad that she's willing to come back in March. I'm also very glad that she speaks English. I added teeth 25, 26 & 27 to my submission and I missed the facial on each of them. I think I was mislead by the probing depths. I only got 1/2's on the anterior teeth and they seemed pretty healthy besides all the supragingival calculus, but I must have been hitting calculus when I probed because I didn't even know there was calculus there until Dr. Hanson pushed my explorer down further and I went right over top of it. I really need to work on exploring and working from different positions so I can feel everything. I gave a PSA injection for the first time and I still need to work on those. I was happy that I didn't need any help on the MSA and ASA though, and I found the correct spot the first time. I really enjoy giving injections while I'm doing it but it scares me to think about it before.

I thought the National Board Exam went pretty good. I finished the test at 1:45 so I was really glad to not be there all day. My favorite part was the case studies and I think I did really well on them. I sure hope I get at least a 75%!! My reward for taking the test was a Butterfinger Blizzard and fries from Dairy Queen and then watching the Bachelor. What a great night :)

At the VA on Thursday I got 6 quads of a Class V and 2 quads of a Class III. The patient with the 2 quads of a Class III was just there in October, but he must have had some major residual calculus because on the distals of every posterior tooth in the UR quad it was SO tenacious. There's no way it could have built up like that in just 4 months. I really need to get some Class IV's. It seems like the same students in my group are always getting the harder classes, and I always get the 1B's and V's. I feel pretty good about my requirements. I need one more 1A and 1B, 6 quads of a III and 8 of a IV. I know the Class IV's are going to be really time consuming so I sure hope I can find one soon!!

Maybe I Really Can Scale

Yesterday was a little bit better in Clinic for me. I worked on the LR quad of a Class 3 and I only missed 3 spots. I'm sure most of the girls in my class never miss 3 spots and that probably sounds like a lot to them, but I was so excited!! Plus they were burnished so at least I actually worked on them. I even got to do 3 more injections so I feel like I'm getting a little better at that. I did fine on the Long Buccal and Mental injections, but I had a little bit of trouble with the IA. This was the first time I've done injections on the right side and I hit bone twice before I finally got it. It was pretty frustrating!!

My afternoon patient qualified for mockboards so I did all the x-rays on her and let another student have her because I already have someone scheduled. I wasn't too worried about cleaning any quads on her because I've already finished my Class II/IV requirements and she had to leave early so I was just glad to be able to get some x-rays out of it. Overall, it was a pretty good day for me in Clinic.

3 down....4 to go

I wish I was talking about my Class 3's and 4's, but I'm just talking about my VA days!! Almost halfway done....YAY!!! I always seem to get the patients that have SO much dang plaque and then I get that written in my evaluation that I missed all the plaque. They should have seen what was there at the first!! Plaque is frustrating to me, to say the least! I can never seem to get all of it. Even if I scale it off, polish it off, floss it off....it just doesn't all come off. I don't know what the deal is!

My patients were both really nice today. I only had a 9:30 patient this morning and that turned out to be really nice. I think he talked about Hawaii for about half the appointment, so there wasn't much time for actually scaling, but it was VERY relaxing!! He had crowns and bridges on all of his anterior teeth and I guess I was under the impression that calculus doesn't build up on them, but that's wrong. I didn't even bother scaling those teeth and so when my instructor came over she said I missed those areas. Oops! Guess I'll be scaling EVERYWHERE now. I should have been doing that before but I've never seen calculus on a crown. WHO KNEW?!?! My afternoon patient was really good too. I got 2 quads of a 3 and 2 quads of a 5 so I'm pretty excited about that. He comes in every 3 months, but he really builds up that calculus fast!! There was major recession going on and it was nice that it wasn't sensitive to him. Usually I start to scale on recessed areas and the patients about fly out of the chair.

I also got to place Arestin on both of my patients today so that was really good practice. Too bad we don't have a few PE's for that one. I was pretty happy with my scaling abilities on the second patient. They've been down the toilet lately and I felt like I actually knew what I was doing today.

Hard Patient or No Patient....Which do I prefer??

This morning I had a Class 3 patient. According to his probe depths and bone level he should have been a Class 2, but he had SO MUCH deposit, and it REALLY didn't want to come off. I worked on the LL quad today and it took FOREVER!!! I thought I was doing such a good job too. When Dr. Hanson came over I told her that I knew there was still deposit on 19D and 21D but that I just couldn't seem to get it off. It turned out that I missed a few more spots than that, and I was feeling really crappy about it, but even Dr. Hanson wasn't able to remove some of the deposits so that made me feel a little bit better. I used almost every instrument, the ultrasonic, gracey's and files on this piece and it still didn't budge. We ended up just making a note in the chart that there was still deposit there and hopefully we'll be able to get it off next time. I also got to give 3 injections so that was nice. 6 down.....29 to go!!

I didn't have an afternoon patient. I called 8 patients to come in and no one was able to so I just helped others in the clinic and did some studying. It is SO stressful to have to find 2 patients every week. I had list of patients that I thought were mine, but it turns out most of them have been scheduled by someone else. How does this happen?? I'm pretty sure I was the preferred provider so I don't know how someone else got their information. RIDICULOUS!!! Oh and BY THE WAY :) There was a patient here today that really wanted to be seen, but Pam was already listed as her preferred provider and the last thing I want to do is steal someone else's patient!