drtools bench test prep review

This forum made possible through the generous support of SDN members, donors, and sponsors. Thank you.

Selan

Full Member
10+ Year Member
Joined
Feb 11, 2013
Messages
13
Reaction score
1
any reviews about drtools bench test prep held at Milpitas, CA??

Members don't see this ad.
 
I have given similar reviews somewhere else on this forum and would do the same for you--My personal feedback: I went to her for most of my bench exam preparation and I would say that she is really good. She is very dedicated and would sincerely critique your preparations. I found the practice sessions very useful too. There are lot of people from bay area that come to her clinic for practice and bench prep course. Also her inventory is pretty good. You can get all the dental material and instruments from here. As I was a local bay area person, buying stuff from her was lot cheaper than ordering it from online. Rather than doing things at home, its always better to show your preps to someone or learn them right. Its a best place to practice and get all your doubts cleared. I dont remember exactly how much her course prep fee is, but you can call at her office and enquire about the course more. Here is the link for her website http://thedrtools.com/.
Hope you find this helpful. All the best.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
Thank you so much for taking time to reply. This is very helpful
 
Members don't see this ad :)
I have given similar reviews somewhere else on this forum and would do the same for you--My personal feedback: I went to her for most of my bench exam preparation and I would say that she is really good. She is very dedicated and would sincerely critique your preparations. I found the practice sessions very useful too. There are lot of people from bay area that come to her clinic for practice and bench prep course. Also her inventory is pretty good. You can get all the dental material and instruments from here. As I was a local bay area person, buying stuff from her was lot cheaper than ordering it from online. Rather than doing things at home, its always better to show your preps to someone or learn them right. Its a best place to practice and get all your doubts cleared. I dont remember exactly how much her course prep fee is, but you can call at her office and enquire about the course more. Here is the link for her website http://thedrtools.com/.
Hope you find this helpful. All the best.
Thank you so much for your reply! So you took those 100$ a day practice sessions as well? I'm planning to practice at home with all the material and going to her every 2 days and showing her the preps.. do you think that should be fine? I just have 2.5 weeks between my interview and her course.. I will be practicing everyday but I'm not sure if that''ll be enough to perfect myself.. Your opinion would help here :)
 
Yup. I took practice sessions at her. Her clinical setting will give you an idea how to do preps beyond your comfort zone (different settings from your home). Also she has UOP models and manual(which are not available at UOP anymore). If in doubt dont hesitate, go ahead and shoot questions about anything and everything. Remember, thats why you are there. All the best!!
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 user
Bad experience with her, wont recommend anyone to go there. After reading these reviews I went from so far, but I am disappointed, I wish I could have my dollars refunded :(
 
Firstly, I hope you know everything they sell is much costly than what you can get from original websites/amazon/ebay. So unless you are in a real hurry, avoid this place. Also the mouth mirror was defective (shows double image).
Then no practice for indirect vision, she said no you can do direct, indirect is not important, but indirect vision techiques she didnt teach which is very imp. Also she didnt teach how to do mounted, she was holding in hand and doing, we all can do, I have been doing the same, why would I go to her?
Then everythng was rushed up, technique was not right , she taught crown preps without placing depth cuts, but that is not the right technique. Also, no method for the reverse S was taught
If you are a first timer, you can get impressed coz you are knowing nothing, so what she tells, you'll be impressed.
But her technique, the way of rushing the things done (no help for onlays, composites, surveying, RCT we got though we requested)
She is dedicated though, hardworking, will be there full time to explain, but the thing is the technique that she explained was wrong
Also, 2 days is quite insufficient. I hope it was more days and more emphasis on total crown preps and everything and more days of practicing were there along with emphasis on indirect vision technique.
@nbde4dds Can you explain your experience?
 
Last edited:
To Duggan Institute,
It's really bad to sell oneself, out of other people's misery. I am a silent observer on this site but your comment forced me to write few things about you as well. I took your 2 week course and would like to share few things. I respect Dr Duggan a lot and there is no doubt about the expertise he got for the dental skills. But don't you feel it's unfair to push people to buy the instruments and burs, that they already have. Sometimes the students are not even asked if they need the instruments or not , they are just given to them and later charged for the same. Already we are paying so much for the expensive course and this additional cost just adds up to everything. For my fellow applicants if you are thinking about joining this 2 weeks course, consider the cost of the course (~$3200), cost of living and meals (~$1o00),instruments fee (~$500 and above ,even if you have opted to bring your own instruments).
Also, Dr Duggan would teach only specific things in his morning lectures. If you ask him even one word extra, he won't help you with that. If you ask him any doubts during bench practice, he would twist your words and won't reply you properly. There was a time when I simply stopped asking my doubts cause I was not getting clear answers.
I am not saying I didn't like your course, but I didn't love it either. The course would have been lot more pleasant experience for me if Dr Duggan would have been more helpful.
 
  • Like
Reactions: 1 users
To Duggan Institute,
It's really bad to sell oneself, out of other people's misery. I am a silent observer on this site but your comment forced me to write few things about you as well. I took your 2 week course and would like to share few things. I respect Dr Duggan a lot and there is no doubt about the expertise he got for the dental skills. But don't you feel it's unfair to push people to buy the instruments and burs, that they already have. Sometimes the students are not even asked if they need the instruments or not , they are just given to them and later charged for the same. Already we are paying so much for the expensive course and this additional cost just adds up to everything. For my fellow applicants if you are thinking about joining this 2 weeks course, consider the cost of the course (~$3200), cost of living and meals (~$1o00),instruments fee (~$500 and above ,even if you have opted to bring your own instruments).
Also, Dr Duggan would teach only specific things in his morning lectures. If you ask him even one word extra, he won't help you with that. If you ask him any doubts during bench practice, he would twist your words and won't reply you properly. There was a time when I simply stopped asking my doubts cause I was not getting clear answers.
I am not saying I didn't like your course, but I didn't love it either. The course would have been lot more pleasant experience for me if Dr Duggan would have been more helpful.
I agree with you. Hope once we graduate, we can help our fellows without doing business and fooling them like these people are doing. No ethics, seriously!! God save their patients
 
Actually, I read a lot of reviews about duggans course before taking the course last month. I didn't find any of wat was said by others negativlely. May be me and my whole batch were lucky, or dr duggans was in good mode, I don't know.
According to dr duggan, our batch was continuously asking questions during the lecture and even the practical sessions, and he was always answering without twisting, as some claim. He tought us even seven eighth crowns preps because someone asked about it during MOD gold onlay lecture. Someone asked about restorations, and he did a demo without any extra fees, even the instruments of restorations, we didn't paid renting fees for practicing.
Secondly, according to instruments, no body was rushed to buy. There was a form that every one request whatever he needed to buy, without pushing or even advising to buy or not. Sometimes, when dr duggan comes to critique the work, he finds the burs are dull, so asking for a new bur, and that's only with carbide burs. In the first day, half of my batch didn't buy new instruments, and they asked dr duggan to help with sharpening their own hand instruments, and he did.
This course is expensive, yeah, could be better, yeah.... But at least if wat u said guys are true, then our batch was very very lucky that we didn't faced these flaws.
 
May be you were the real lucky batch. . But it is really hard for me to believe that Dr Duggan went all his way out to show you new things especially restorations. I wonder then why has he kept another expensive course just for restorations.
 
May be u took the course a long ago. May be every thing is changed there after they got the feedback for more than 5 years, even the institute facility itself has changed. It's bigger now, and it's a lovely place, really I liked it much, I've spent there 15 days from 6 am to 9 pm everyday....
In general, most of critiques about duggans course are money wise, in the other hand, duggans is the only one that has an option to pay in installments for 6 months, if u can't afford the fees instantly.
 
Top