Reconsider dentistry? Help!!

[heyitscyndi]

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Hey guys, here's the deal. I've got 30 hours of shadowing general dentists, pediatric dentists, and orthodontists under my belt and I really enjoyed it. Today I went to shadow an oral surgeon and got completely irked out watching the girls put the patient to sleep. I've shadowed in an operating room before, that was no big deal. The dental work was no big deal. It was the putting to sleep with the needles that I don't like. So should I be rethinking this? How much of that thing will I have to deal with in school? Please help!!

 

[USAF_Dentman]

Hey guys, here's the deal. I've got 30 hours of shadowing general dentists, pediatric dentists, and orthodontists under my belt and I really enjoyed it. Today I went to shadow an oral surgeon and got completely irked out watching the girls put the patient to sleep. I've shadowed in an operating room before, that was no big deal. The dental work was no big deal. It was the putting to sleep with the needles that I don't like. So should I be rethinking this? How much of that thing will I have to deal with in school? Please help!!

I doubt you'll even come across it much in D-school, as most patients are NOT put to sleep with intravenous injections. Unless you go through a lot of surgery rotations or residency...

 

[Mo007]

Dentistry is not about putting people to sleep, and although you have shadowed a "terrifying" procedure in your opinion... it's a specialist procedure that most Dentists don't have to face.

It's just like the weather... some people can't tolerate winter, but live with it. 😀

 

[Biogirl361]

i wouldn't worry about it... you've just decided you don't want to be an oral surgeon, that's all 🙂

 

[heyitscyndi]

Thanks alot for the advice. I just kinda freaked out this morning after I got home. Oral surgery is definately not for me!!

 

[Yah-E]

i wouldn't worry about it... you've just decided you don't want to be an oral surgeon, that's all 🙂

Keep in mind, a lot of Pedodontists AND general dentists do IV sedation with needles in their offices, not ONLY OMFSs.

It was the putting to sleep with the needles that I don't like.

Cyndi, what exactly about that procedure you don't like? If it's the needle part, then, yes I encourage to reconsider dentistry because you'll be around needles all day. Heck in dental school, you'll be poked by your classmates when learning how to give local anesthetic injections. You'll poke them and they will poke you. Some dental schools even have you learn IV sedation on one another.

If it's the finding the veins on an arm that you don't like, then again, I encourage you to reconsider because in Gross Anatomy class, you'll see more than that!

Dentistry is not all pretty and smily like the SWAN or Extreme Makeover, it's definitely not all smiling kids like you have seen in Pedodontists or in Ortho. You'll see a lot more gross stuff like oral pathology, gross carious lesions, and bombed out mouths in dental school before you can pick and choose what you want to see in dentistry.

In short, yes, do reconsider because you haven't really seen anything yet.

 

[Biogirl361]

i'm pretty sure that general dentists and pedos don't have to do iv sedation if they don't want to, i wouldn't give up dentistry altogether just bc of iv sedation. also obviously if she shadowed general dentist and other specialists with no problem then the normal anesthetizing must not bother her.

can you opt out of this iv sedation class? i know i for one am not letting students or anyone for that matter sedate me if i don't need it.

 

[aphistis]

i'm pretty sure that general dentists and pedos don't have to do iv sedation if they don't want to, i wouldn't give up dentistry altogether just bc of iv sedation. also obviously if she shadowed general dentist and other specialists with no problem then the normal anesthetizing must not bother her.

can you opt out of this iv sedation class? i know i for one am not letting students or anyone for that matter sedate me if i don't need it.

There's no "opting out" of any classes in dental school. I don't have anything solid to confirm this with, but anecdotally I don't think many schools do much pre-doc training in IV sedation. Can anyone corroborate or refute this?

 

[Bullfan16]

Although not in dental school...my father earned a fellowship in general anesthesia as a nurse anesthetist while in dental school (3rd and 4th years of school plus 1 extra year after graduation). He does not utilize general anesthesia (ie patient is totally knocked out and you need to breathe for patient...due to respiratory depression...basically used for surgeries in a hospital or typically long cases). He does make use of sedatives like talwin (IV) and is trained in all facets of IV sedation. The downside is he needs his own monitoring equipment and has to both watch (carefully) the patient's vitals as well as do the dental work. Its all oupatient work and he puts them out enough so they can respond to questions (such as does this hurt, how do you feel, etc) and just enough so they dont remember anything (pretty long cases...he sees generally 3-4 patients a day). Usually patients come in pre-medicated so they are a bit more relaxed. One last thing...the interesting thing about this is when I was explaining PBL to him he said "I do it everyday"....unlike in most dental procedures, when going to sedate a patient, he really has to know health history because in some cases if their health is too compromised he has to make a decision if it is safe or unsafe to sedate the patient (really in all cases he has to determine if its safe)

In terms of needles...I am with Yah-E on this one...you have to inject local into each other at some point in a particular class and this involves short and long needles (yellow cap and blue cap...forgot what they are called). I am surprised after shadowing everyone you had that you didnt encounter a local injection. I have seen too many to count...I will say however if you are ok with everything else (blood included) you will probably be ok...but be sure to know you will see needles.

In terms of IV sedation, I have heard that Pedodontists and Periodontists as well as OMFS are trained or can be trained to do general IV sedation, I am pretty sure you wont do this or practice while in dental school. My dad did this at a hospital near the dental school. He mentioned that pharmacology was the one class that he wished they went into more detail in dental school and he learned a lot more about the material when he worked at the hospital ("thats the most important one" according to him). I guess it goes without saying that its a no brainer that you learn more pharmacology while learning how to sedate patients.

 

[heyitscyndi]

Keep in mind, a lot of Pedodontists AND general dentists do IV sedation with needles in their offices, not ONLY OMFSs.



Cyndi, what exactly about that procedure you don't like? If it's the needle part, then, yes I encourage to reconsider dentistry because you'll be around needles all day. Heck in dental school, you'll be poked by your classmates when learning how to give local anesthetic injections. You'll poke them and they will poke you. Some dental schools even have you learn IV sedation on one another.

If it's the finding the veins on an arm that you don't like, then again, I encourage you to reconsider because in Gross Anatomy class, you'll see more than that!

Dentistry is not all pretty and smily like the SWAN or Extreme Makeover, it's definitely not all smiling kids like you have seen in Pedodontists or in Ortho. You'll see a lot more gross stuff like oral pathology, gross carious lesions, and bombed out mouths in dental school before you can pick and choose what you want to see in dentistry.

In short, yes, do reconsider because you haven't really seen anything yet.

I think what scared me the most was everything that was going on in the room. It was the first time that I've seen a patient being preped and there was so much going on around him I saw how terrified this kid was. So no, I didn't like that part of it. When I shadowed a pediatric dentist in the operating room, the patient was already asleep with the IV put in when the dr. and i got in there. So I didn't have a problem with that. Blood and guts are no biggie, and I do realize that I will be giving injections, I don't think that was the issue in this case. I think it was fear of the unknown that was the big issue.

In terms of knowing how to do IV sedation I know that it requires much more training and I don't think the school I'm looking at has that in its curriculum. I spoke with my orthodontist about it because he went to UMKC and he said that I won't have to deal with that unless I decide to do rotations in oral surgery.

But I'm with Biogirl, I'm not letting anyone sedate me if I can keep from it!