- Joined
- May 21, 2012
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Hi fellow pre-dents,
I am an incoming senior who was planning on applying to dental school next cycle and so I have been shadowing a great deal lately in order to gain a better understanding of the profession and the day to day activities of a dentist.
Anyway, the first dentist I shadowed was awesome. He had really great relationships with his patients (many had been coming from 10+ years), was funny, seemed to do good work (but what do I know?) and recommended dentistry wholeheartedly. He was incredibly supportive and I had a lot of fun shadowing!
However, the second dentist I shadowed seems extremely pessimistic about the profession and has been actively discouraging me every time I go to shadow him. He complains that it is really hard to find patients nowadays because of the saturation (his clinic is in a suburb of a large city), that mid-levels will take all the jobs for graduating dentists, and that dentists will be out of work when some cavity cure comes out removing what he calls the bread and butter of his practice. He says that he is looking into another career within the next five years and says that dentistry is not what it is used to be.
I was really excited to become a dentist when I shadowed the first dentist. He went on vacation and so I have been shadowing this second dentist and although he seems a little bitter, I wonder if there is any truth to what he is saying? Is this possible or is it just that he is not the type of person that should have become a dentist in the first place?
I have only shadowed two dentists extensively so I have a very limited experience of the dental profession as a whole. Can someone please shed more light on what was said by this second dentist and whether there is any truth to it?
I am an incoming senior who was planning on applying to dental school next cycle and so I have been shadowing a great deal lately in order to gain a better understanding of the profession and the day to day activities of a dentist.
Anyway, the first dentist I shadowed was awesome. He had really great relationships with his patients (many had been coming from 10+ years), was funny, seemed to do good work (but what do I know?) and recommended dentistry wholeheartedly. He was incredibly supportive and I had a lot of fun shadowing!
However, the second dentist I shadowed seems extremely pessimistic about the profession and has been actively discouraging me every time I go to shadow him. He complains that it is really hard to find patients nowadays because of the saturation (his clinic is in a suburb of a large city), that mid-levels will take all the jobs for graduating dentists, and that dentists will be out of work when some cavity cure comes out removing what he calls the bread and butter of his practice. He says that he is looking into another career within the next five years and says that dentistry is not what it is used to be.
I was really excited to become a dentist when I shadowed the first dentist. He went on vacation and so I have been shadowing this second dentist and although he seems a little bitter, I wonder if there is any truth to what he is saying? Is this possible or is it just that he is not the type of person that should have become a dentist in the first place?
I have only shadowed two dentists extensively so I have a very limited experience of the dental profession as a whole. Can someone please shed more light on what was said by this second dentist and whether there is any truth to it?
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