Wasn't there a Bon Jovi song about "the more things change, the more they stay the same?" Am I dating myself? Actually, my dental school years were before the big hair of Bon Jovi, and more Loggins and Messina, James Taylor, and Eric Clapton.
We didn't have fancy mannequins with water and suction on which to do our practice drilling. In the days before OSHA regulations about infection control, we used actual extracted teeth mounted on to plaster. We had to beg for these teeth from our own dentists and oral surgeons. If we were asked to perform a certain type of filling, on a certain type of tooth, we'd have to dig into our saved jars of teeth. We'd search like miners panning for gold, looking for the perfect bicuspid or molar, then carefully place that tooth into a bed of wet plaster, wait for it to dry, and then drill away.
Are there similarities between 1980 and 2010 dental school learning? Absolutely. Students at UNLV might have the luxury of premounted teeth, water and suction. However, the meticulous exactness required to excavate a very tiny space hasn't changed. Students today must learn how to use indirect vision, working with a small mirror, just as their elder counterparts did thirty years ago. Treating one's first "live" patient, no matter how small the cavity in their tooth, is still exciting.
No comments:
Post a Comment