Oops!!!

[12YearOldKid]

---

Members don't see this ad.

I thought it might be fun to share some horror stories from clinic.

There is a legend at my school that a girl once took an impression in mounting stone and it took nearly five hours to chip/drill it off. I don't know how true that is, but it's a story that everyone likes to tell.

Some other accidents that have happened in our clinics in the last month or so. A girl pulled an aluminum matrix band out across a patient's numb lip and it sliced the patient so bad she needed three sutures. Not what you bargain for on an MO amalgam. 😱

One of the juniors was removing a palatal torus; he didn't listen to his assistant telling him he was just about there and he ended perfing into the sinus.

Minor things that happen pretty commonly but are still kinda fun to tell: sophomores removing composite cingulum rests during a prophy appointment and mobile teeth coming out in a PVS impression.

 

[tjb]

The following happened at Pitt and they are not rumors.

A dental student used a separating disc in a patients mouth to section a bridge and ended up severing the lingual artery!

Another student was doing a large amalgam preparation and accidentally sliced open the pts cheek with the drill. An instructor told him to stop what he was doing, temporize with ZOE and send the pt to OMS to suture up the cheek. When the instructor comes back to check the temporized tooth he finds that the student had packed the cheek full of ZOE rather than the tooth! Ouch!!!!

tjb

 

[omfsres]

The following happened at Pitt and they are not rumors.

A dental student used a separating disc in a patients mouth to section a bridge and ended up severing the lingual artery!

Another student was doing a large amalgam preparation and accidentally sliced open the pts cheek with the drill. An instructor told him to stop what he was doing, temporize with ZOE and send the pt to OMS to suture up the cheek. When the instructor comes back to check the temporized tooth he finds that the student had packed the cheek full of ZOE rather than the tooth! Ouch!!!!

tjb

I believe that plaster was used prior to the development of alginate to make impressions. So this used to happen routinely. Not the stuff legends are made of.

 

[DrJeff]

Actual events that I witnessed(directly or was atleast in the clinic when it occurred) during my dental school years:

1) A classmate of mine during a perio screening patient probed and recorded pockets of a maxillary complete denture 😱

2) While doing the occlussal rim adjust visit for full complete denture fabrication, a student a year behind me (while in the operatory next to me) tipped over the bunsen burner and set the bracket table on fire 😱

And then of course there are the COUNTLESS stories of working on the wrong tooth, extracting the wrong tooth, anesthetizing the wrong side, etc, etc, etc. These are stories that still get a good laugh at each and every reunion and/or dental meeting when you get together with your classmates!

 

[lnn2]

The following happened at Pitt and they are not rumors.

A dental student used a separating disc in a patients mouth to section a bridge and ended up severing the lingual artery!

Another student was doing a large amalgam preparation and accidentally sliced open the pts cheek with the drill. An instructor told him to stop what he was doing, temporize with ZOE and send the pt to OMS to suture up the cheek. When the instructor comes back to check the temporized tooth he finds that the student had packed the cheek full of ZOE rather than the tooth! Ouch!!!!

tjb

I heard about the second story but not the first one, ouch! Was it the metal disc in Prostho kit? I have never used it. I'm afraid that I might cut one of my fingers off 😱

 

[unlvdmd]

We go on rotations around town to specialty practices. I wasn't on this one, but a classmate was: the oral surgeon of many years was supposed to take out 4 primary teeth of a girl that came from ortho, but he took out secondarys (they were not 3rds). I forgot which teeth they were exactly, but I know it was for sure true!

 

[delicious]

Actual events that I witnessed(directly or was atleast in the clinic when it occurred) during my dental school years:

1) A classmate of mine during a perio screening patient probed and recorded pockets of a maxillary complete denture 😱

2) While doing the occlussal rim adjust visit for full complete denture fabrication, a student a year behind me (while in the operatory next to me) tipped over the bunsen burner and set the bracket table on fire 😱

And then of course there are the COUNTLESS stories of working on the wrong tooth, extracting the wrong tooth, anesthetizing the wrong side, etc, etc, etc. These are stories that still get a good laugh at each and every reunion and/or dental meeting when you get together with your classmates!

This sounds like mistakes I'll make when I finally get to the clinics. 😛 I'm such a space-cadet sometimes. Admit it or not, everybody will make at least one huge, dumb mistake in dental school. And when it happens to me, I'll tell you guys all about it so long as it doesn't give away my identity. The good thing is that you might say, pull the wrong tooth, but at least you're not amputating the wrong limb. Or, you're not a pathologist misdiagnosing breast cancer and giving the go-ahead for a mastectomy. That would kill me.

 

[12YearOldKid]

I just want to laugh at the person who put ZOE in a laceration. We have a few of "those" people in my class too.

But I know as soon as I rail into someone for being so stupid I am going to do something twice as bad. I've found that when it comes to clinic you just have to leave your ego at home because EVERYBODY screws up -- and those who think they don't are the scariest ones of all. 😀

 

[Energon]

I heard about the second story but not the first one, ouch! Was it the metal disc in Prostho kit? I have never used it. I'm afraid that I might cut one of my fingers off 😱

We call those discs "career enders"

There was a guy on our OMFS rotation who was attempting an IA block. Did not bother feeling for the ramus of the mandible, inserted the needle way too proximal, went right through the cheek of the patient and then proceeded to stick himself in the finger.

 

[12YearOldKid]

Are you guys talking about the giant metal wheel of death? I've used those to enhance the embrasures on provisionals but no way I'd ever take one of those intra-oral. I'd spend an hour sectioning a bridge with a 330 before I'd put that in someone's mouth. Even the tiny composite polishing discs make me a little nervous.

 

[toofache32]

Yep, I pulled the wrong tooth on a lady in dental school. It's a long story and I'm just glad that it happened while I was in school.

I was also cutting a crown prep on #19 and my bur sort of...ummm..."caught" the tongue. All that meat got wrapped around my bur. He was numb and didn't even know it. Looking back, sutures probably would have helped but the mouth heals regardlessly. I told him that I nicked his tongue and it would be sore for a couple of days.

Also, here in my oral surgery residency, I was called by the trauma team to see an intubated patient with a "mobile maxilla", which turned out to be an upper denture. I pulled it out and set it on the patient's chest and walked out. Not the sort of thing I liked waking up for at 3am.

 

[msf41]

I was observing a dentist performing his "first" ever CEREC restoration. He was borrowing the machine from his partner, who would pop into the operatory once in a while and say, "yup...looks like you are doing it right." I could tell that the Dentist was really making things up as he went along. Anyway, he took the digital impression, manipulated the 3-D restoration image, it looked great on the screen, then he milled it. Just take the crown out and pop it on the prepped tooth right???? He popped on the crown and said sh*Y)(&^!

The crown had about a 1 mm gap from hitting the upper teeth. He had made the prep TOO SHORT! It left a hole big enough to stick their tounge into.

About 2 hours worth of prep and fitting work down the drain only to need start over and do it the old fashioned way. Better to leave just a little too much and grind 'er down than to leave the crown just a little too short.

 

[delicious]

Oh man, people like you scare the hell outta me!! 😱 You're not even in dental school yet, and you know more than me (& I'm finishing up 1st year dental). CEREC, 3-D restoration image, old-fashioned way.... what on earth are you talking about?!! There's a machine for doing crowns? I understand the crown being too short, but the rest... 😕 Lord help me.

I was observing a dentist performing his "first" ever CEREC restoration. He was borrowing the machine from his partner, who would pop into the operatory once in a while and say, "yup...looks like you are doing it right." I could tell that the Dentist was really making things up as he went along. Anyway, he took the digital impression, manipulated the 3-D restoration image, it looked great on the screen, then he milled it. Just take the crown out and pop it on the prepped tooth right???? He popped on the crown and said sh*Y)(&^!

The crown had about a 1 mm gap from hitting the upper teeth. He had made the prep TOO SHORT! It left a hole big enough to stick their tounge into.

About 2 hours worth of prep and fitting work down the drain only to need start over and do it the old fashioned way. Better to leave just a little too much and grind 'er down than to leave the crown just a little too short.

 

[12YearOldKid]

Also, here in my oral surgery residency, I was called by the trauma team to see an intubated patient with a "mobile maxilla", which turned out to be an upper denture. I pulled it out and set it on the patient's chest and walked out. Not the sort of thing I liked waking up for at 3am.

Mobile maxilla... that's hilarious.

BTW, don't be too freaked out by msf41, delicious. He knows the words but he doesn't have a clue what he is talking about. (no offense, msf41) You can't just leave a crown prep high and then grind the prep down until the crown seats right. If only it were that easy.

 

[UDM or bust]

i'm going to be chuckling about the mobile maxilla for the rest of the weekend

 

[rsweeney]

Are you guys talking about the giant metal wheel of death? I've used those to enhance the embrasures on provisionals but no way I'd ever take one of those intra-oral. I'd spend an hour sectioning a bridge with a 330 before I'd put that in someone's mouth. Even the tiny composite polishing discs make me a little nervous.

Next time I am in lab I must remember to count how many interdental papillae in my plastic patient I have chopped up with those polishing disks. NO WAY would I use those in clinic.

 

[ItsGavinC]

These stories are great. We start clinic in a couple of weeks so I'm sure I'll have my share of stories to tell and spread around.

 

[omaralt]

haha u guys are funny, i'm looking forward to starting clinic in like 2 years. but just wondering, can u guys get sued??? or is teh school completly responsible? wondering, cuz some of this stuff might be a huge lawsuit out in the real world.

omar

 

[msf41]

Mobile maxilla... that's hilarious.

BTW, don't be too freaked out by msf41, delicious. He knows the words but he doesn't have a clue what he is talking about. (no offense, msf41) You can't just leave a crown prep high and then grind the prep down until the crown seats right. If only it were that easy.

You've got me pegged 12YearOldKid,

Everything I know about CEREC really is in those 3 sentences. 😀 It is quite a bit more involved in that, and I have no idea about the details of CEREC, even though I've seen several CEREC restorations done. And by the way, no offense
taken.

 

[LSR1979]

First day of operative lab I dropped a high speed running at full RPM with a brand new 330/H24 burr in my lap. It landed less than an inch from my, well, let's say, male extension, and put a nice hole in my thigh. Ruined a new pair of scrub pants, but at that point I didn't care. I was just glad it didn't land on my (not so) little friend. 😀

 

[IWuvTeef]

First day of operative lab I dropped a high speed running at full RPM with a brand new 330/H24 burr in my lap. It landed less than an inch from my, well, let's say, male extension, and put a nice hole in my thigh. Ruined a new pair of scrub pants, but at that point I didn't care. I was just glad it didn't land on my (not so) little friend. 😀

right... 😛

 

[toofache32]

First day of operative lab I dropped a high speed running at full RPM with a brand new 330/H24 burr in my lap. It landed less than an inch from my, well, let's say, male extension, and put a nice hole in my thigh. Ruined a new pair of scrub pants, but at that point I didn't care. I was just glad it didn't land on my (not so) little friend. 😀

To get that close, you must have really good aim.

 

[HuyetKiem]

First day of operative lab I dropped a high speed running at full RPM with a brand new 330/H24 burr in my lap. It landed less than an inch from my, well, let's say, male extension, and put a nice hole in my thigh. Ruined a new pair of scrub pants, but at that point I didn't care. I was just glad it didn't land on my (not so) little friend. 😀

Wow.. you were so lucky, dork. 😱 😱 😱

Good Morning, Last Friday I heard some very sad news. A pediatric dentist at Children's Hospital, Buffalo died from a flesh eating disease. A dentist he worked with thinks this young dentist nicked himself in the groin on a burr. He developed an infection which turned into the flesh eating disease. This happened approx. 3 weeks ago and the poor man died on March 13. He was in his 30's and had a wife and young children. This is tragic and I hope all of us will be more careful after hearing about this.

 

[LSR1979]

Wow.. you were so lucky, dork. 😱 😱 😱

So now I'm a dork? Well I've been called worse. Don't worry, I dropped the whole name calling thing in the 3rd or 4th grade so I won't resort back to it here.

 

[Jediwendell]

At UK we had a guy lock on a PVS impression then cut three teeth in half with a diamond bur trying to get it off. That was nice.

 

[aphistis]

At UK we had a guy lock on a PVS impression then cut three teeth in half with a diamond bur trying to get it off. That was nice.

...The heck? How do you lock an impression on THAT tight?

 

[airvent]

At UK we had a guy lock on a PVS impression then cut three teeth in half with a diamond bur trying to get it off. That was nice.

So what happens afterward? Does he get a C- ? Or are there more serious consequences. I guess the patients know that they are dealing with students

 

[Extraction]

At UK we had a guy lock on a PVS impression then cut three teeth in half with a diamond bur trying to get it off. That was nice.

Did he get to do some free root canals, and crowns on the patient afterwards? Maybe he just needed endo badly.

 

[lnn2]

One girl in my class farted in front of her patient and it sounded like she had a microphone in her @ss 😱

 

[Jediwendell]

...The heck? How do you lock an impression on THAT tight?

Its called tori, a permanent lingual retainer and a bridge. You gotta watch for tori/bridge combo on the lower, its real easy to do with PVS and a metal tray. Needless to say, the guy needed a lot of work afterwards. The guy eventually got booted from school, but it was more due to him taking out a tooth on a different person without telling anybody he was going to do it. He just walked him right up to OMS and took it out without any faculty knowing about it on either end.

 

[toofache32]

Its called tori, a permanent lingual retainer and a bridge. You gotta watch for tori/bridge combo on the lower, its real easy to do with PVS and a metal tray. Needless to say, the guy needed a lot of work afterwards. The guy eventually got booted from school, but it was more due to him taking out a tooth on a different person without telling anybody he was going to do it. He just walked him right up to OMS and took it out without any faculty knowing about it on either end.

damn.

 

[gryffindor]

Not really a procedure story, but I think it could fit here.

Early in my residency, I had a patient on my schedule come early to her appointment. I was working on someone else, but apparently the patient took one look at me and told the assistant in Spanish that she wanted to be reassigned to a male doctor. I didn't really care b/c that just meant one less patient I have to see, but I later asked the assistant why the patient requested to switch.

Turns out that the patient is actually a "he" in the process of transitioning to a "she" and because of this, the patient does not like female doctors and only wants to be treated by male doctors.

Go figure!