Yes, we love to hate them, but here’s some sparkling news for dentists

Here’s some lovely news for dentists. In its Patient Experiences report of 2022–23, the Australian Bureau of Statistics indicates that more than 86 per cent of people 15 years and over who saw a dentist reported that the professional always listened carefully to them, always showed them respect and always spent enough time with them.

The not-so-lovely news is that in the same period, almost a third of the people with dental problems delayed or didn’t see a dental professional when needed.

It’s no fun, but it’s essential. Credit: SMH

I reckon a shout-out to dentists is long overdue. They’re a much-maligned breed. It’s not their fault they’ve chosen a profession everyone loves to hate. True, they charge through the nose (bad analogy) but so do bricklayers and plumbers – although people are happy to welcome bricklayers and plumbers into their home because it means that something’s being built or fixed and you have nothing to fear in the mouth department (unless you don’t pay the bill!).

The dentist is perhaps the only professional on the planet who no one wants to see. More insulting, some people have to be knocked unconscious before even seeing them – just look at all the ads for sleep dentistry. (I know, I know.)

We all have our phobias, but put yourself in the dentist’s shoes. Imagine waking every morning knowing that the 10 patients on today’s schedule would rather be visiting a sewage farm than stepping into your nice clean CaviCide-smelling clinic – the one you’ve spent five years at uni to create.

Something happened at the dentist’s the other day that’s doubled my admiration for these eight-hour-a-day surgeons who dabble in human blood and pus and drool. We were in the middle of root canal treatment when the dental chair conked out.

The drill, usually so smart and speedy, splutters to a halt inside my lower right four. The automatic cup filler emits not a drop, the chair elevator leaves me suspended in the air like a passenger on a ferris wheel. “We’ll have to try the surgery down the hall,” says the impossibly young Dr Dan, boggle-eyed because this has never happened before. But my tooth has been dammed with a balloon thing and my mouth is gaping like the entrance to Luna Park.

“I’ll just cover your mouth with this cloth so nothing flies in there,” he says.

Will I have to roll into his arms?

The drama spreads to all the other dental chairs and suddenly dentists and nurses and admins are running in every direction. Shouting. Everyone has their mouth open, not just the patients. It’s Toothmageddon in there.

Of course, today’s dentistry is light years away from the work of the world’s first dentist, Hesy-Ra, who treated pharaohs and pyramid workers alike – specialising in extractions (and gemstone grills). Dentists today go the extra mile to make their clients feel happy-er. They put tellies on their ceilings and posters of monkeys on the walls to distract us. They give us dark goggles to block out the light or anything that resembles a sharp steely object coming down to land on our tissuey tarmac.

I once had a dentist who’d do anything not to say “injection”. “Just a little prickle” she’d say. Or “a little sting” or “a little jab”. Everything was “little”, except for the barn of a cavity she was about to blast out of existence. And the bill.

And they’re so considerate now. Knowing I’d just returned from a trip to India, Dr Dan chooses some soothing bansuri flute music for us to listen to, as he tucks me up in a blanket and applies Vaseline to my lips.

This won’t hurt a bit … no, seriously.Credit: iStock

A quick word on Dr Dan. Not sure if it’s his kind eyes or his readiness to laugh at my sick mum jokes or his patience when I ask if he’s ever been bitten. Fact is, he’s a delight. He gives a little yoga lesson while he’s giving you an injection. “Breathe in deeply through your nose,” he says. “Keep your shoulders down” and then “breathe out through your mouth” at the exact time he plunges the needle in a westerly direction. It’s a bit like yanking a cow’s tail before giving her a pregnancy test.

So back to the root canal treatment. It sounds fashionably awful but in fact it’s no more painful than having a filling because, and this is important, your mouth has been numbed. And once your mouth is numb, you may as well entertain the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra in there because you feel nothing beyond some bumping and hear nothing beyond some drilling. Which has now stopped.

And this is where I really love my new young dentist. Does he panic? No. Does he dash next door for a cappuccino? No. He quietly disappears into the utilities room, flicks a few switches, adjusts a few doodads and has the entire set of dental chairs up and running in 20 minutes. It’s a software problem, see? Nothing to do with electricity. Breathe in, now out.

I’m not sure if Dr Dan’s a new-age dentist or a computer nerd or just a wunderkind. Whatever. I have total faith and I’ll gladly attend his bar mitzvah.

Jo Stubbings is a freelance writer and reviewer.