Bitter Sweet

Well, it's over.  I can't believe that after two years of working my butt off, it is all over.  Today was the last clinic day.  It doesn't quite feel real yet.  I think it will be more so when we actually have to take all of our "crap" home.  I wanted to really push myself today so I scheduled two class V patients for the morning and what I thought was a class III for the afternoon.  The morning went just as I had hoped.  I didn't need to take any x-rays on either of my am patients.  From start to finish each took me about 1 hour 10 minutes.  I didn't think that was too bad considering we need scale checks and charts signed before starting.

We enjoyed a fabulous potluck lunch together, instructors and all!  It was very enjoyable to sit down a eat a meal together.  We had stuffed taco shells (is that what they were called, Kristie?), soup, salad, chips/salsa, and many desserts.  Oh, it was so yummy!  Thanks everyone for contributing to our feast!  It was so good!

My afternoon went a little differently than I had expected.  I was planning on two Jr. students coming in to work on my patient.  I thought he was four quads of a class III, but he wasn't.  The last time I cleaned him I was given two quads of a III and two of a V.  The two girls that were supposed to come in, came in in the morning and worked on Leigh's patient.  That turned out to be good because my patient for sure didn't have 4 quads of a III.  Another Jr. was going to be in clinic in hopes of getting some IIIs.  I begged, well not really, Jen to let two quads remain a III so that this student could clean my patient and hopefully finish up some requirements.  So, I proceeded to clean my patient's mandible.  Easy-peasy!  Then we had to wait on the Jr. to finish scaling one quad on another patient.  My patient really needed to get back to work, but within a couple of minutes the student was ready.  I couldn't believe how much he was making my patient bleed!  My patient had a couple of deep pockets, but he shouldn't have been bleeding the way he was.  When we finally got him finished up and I walked him out, I told him that he might be a little tender later tonight.  He told me that he could definitely tell a difference in the way this other student and I scaled.  When I was exploring around to check for calculus, a chunk of tissue came up with my explorer!  This other student made the comment "oh a blood clot!"  I thought "no you dope, that isn't a blood clot. you cut off his tissue!"  I felt bad sending my patient away on a rough note!  I wish that I could have just finished him up myself and gotten him out of there faster.  What's done is done.  I will make sure this patient gets taken care of by my peer pal.  She'll do a great job!

Well, here we are at the end of our university experience.  I am terrified and excited and can't wait to see what the future holds!  I hope for the best for all of my hygiene friends and me.  I hope that we each get what we want out of our careers!  Good luck to us all as we head out to our futures!  I love you guys and will miss you dearly!  Thank you for making my hygiene education so amazing!

Here's to signing off for the last time!  Here we go, Dental Hygiene Class of 2012!  Let's do this!

What a day

It was a bizarre day!  I had a very productive morning.  Trev came in and I did the Velscope PE. (By the way, abnormal tissue will appear red to purple to black through the Velscope.  I will never forget that.)  I did a diagnodent experience and passed off the air powder polisher on him so that I could place a sealant.  I also had a class V patient come in at 9:30.  Took a little longer than I wanted to, but everything went fine.

My afternoon was a little crazy.  MeChel and I were switching patients so that I could finish up my class IVs and she could get some class IIIs.  My patient was a little late and Karlie had to get MeChel's patient numb, so it all worked out.  I had to take some intraoral photos of my patient so that I could use him as my Eagle Soft patient.  The pictures were really blurry and I couldn't figure out why!  MeChel is a genius!  I had put on the barrier back words and didn't have the clear side facing the camera.  Blond moment #1.  Eventually I got some intraoral photos.  My patient then wanted to brush his teeth since he hadn't done that yet.  While he is brushing his teeth he is trying to turn the water on.  I don't know what he did, but all of a sudden water is arching out of the eye flushing station!  Water is going everywhere.  I put the eye covers back on the spout and I show him how to turn the water on.  Water goes spraying everywhere again!  I guess there was a little button at the back of the faucet that my patient had pushed when trying to turn on the water.  You would think it would have occurred to me to explain to my patient how to turn on the motion sensor faucets.  But I didn't.  Blond moment #2!  Finally it is figured out and I get the floor mopped up.  In the midst of all of the confusion, I fail to write in my patient's chart and get it signed before MeChel starts to work on him.  (Thanks for reminding me in front of Alexander, MeChel!  I love you anyway! ;)

At this point I get started on MeChel's patient.  I am feeling really shaky from the beginning of the appointment, but I know that I have to get these quads done.  I get some help from Marilyn on the right side.  I move on to the upper left quad and have an area that I don't feel completely confident about.  I am starting to feel light headed and decide that I would like Perry to come advise me.  I go to get him and explain that I am feeling light headed an that my hands are feeling numb.  The instructors say, "sit down and take off your lab coat and mask."  Perry goes to check my patient.  I missed two areas, but not in the quad in question.  My hands proceeded to feel more and more tingly.  I couldn't get my right thumb to straighten out without real effort.  It was the strangest sensation!  Thank you to everyone who helped me today.  For cleaning up my room, writing in my chart, bagging my instruments, driving me and Zach home!  You guys are the best!

I just don't know how I am going to get out into practice and be able to do perio if I can't do it in school.  I looked at taleval and Perry gave me several checks for lateral pressure, yet I had had him come over to check my lateral pressure and stroke.  He told me it looked and sounded right.  I think he is the only instructor that gives me bad marks.  Maybe it has to do with the fact that he freaks me out and I just do crappy work under pressure!  Maybe things will be better under the supervision of a dentist.  I sure hope so!

I cried!

What an emotional day!  Let me rephrase that, what an emotional hour!  I get a text from McCall saying she received her clinical board results and that she passed.  Yeah, McCall!  So, nervously I head up stairs to my computer to see if my results are in.  Sure enough.  I have an email saying my results are in.  Terrified, I look up my pass word for WREB and go to see my results.  The only thing I can focus on is at the bottom of the page and it says:  EXAM RESULTS: FAIL!!!  Fail?  I am looking at those words and at the score trying to figure this all out.  I immediately called McCall to have her help me discern what I was looking at.  I start to cry because I am freaking out!  She tells me that her result page said the same thing and to only look at the score.  If it is higher than 75 than I passed.  I did!!! YEAH!  I am so happy.  I continued to cry for a few minutes because my emotions were just right on the surface.  I am so happy to know that I don't have to relive that awful experience again.  The reason it said I failed is due to my process of care results.  They still aren't in.  I don't understand why it is taking them so long to get those results.  I took that test nearly 2 months ago.  I think it is horrible that they have failed at the bottom of that page.  That was a terrible trick for WREB to play on all of us!

More REQUIREMENTS!?!

So, I just found out this week that there are more requirements that I haven't done or even thought I needed to do.  My advice to the incoming 2nd year students is to print out the syllabus and read it again in the spring semester.  I just found out that of the 36 quads of a class III/IV, 4 quads HAVE to be a class IV.  Did not know that!  Maybe I did in the fall, but forgot as time went on.  So this is what I found out I still have to do:
2 oral irrigation experiences
2 diagnodent experiences
2 desensitization experiences
4 quads of a class IV

I had a class V come in this morning and got him done in about an hour and 15 minutes.  I had to present at NCUR today with my table clinic group.  This afternoon I was going to pass of my right/left ultrasonic tip PE and do oral irrigation.  My patient no showed so that left me with not much to do.  Marianne was sweet enough to let me scale her teeth a little and use the diagnodent.  The diagnodent in clinic stinks.  It doesn't calibrate correctly, so really it doesn't work.  I will need one more experience with it so my plan is to use it on Trevor when he comes in for a sealant next week.  Poor guy!  I am passing off the Velscope and Air Powder Polisher PE, using the diagnodent and placing a sealant.  I think I used the air powder polisher on him last year as well to pass off a PE.  Thanks honey for letting me torture you each time you come in.

I deserve to fail

In clinic at Weber, I saw what I thought was a class II patient in the morning.  From his probe depths I thought he would be a II, but once I started cleaning I realized he was definitely a III!  I talked to Perry about giving me a least a couple quads of a III and had to defend why I deserved that.  Because I worked dang hard, that's why!  Perry comes over to do my scale check and I missed sooooo many spots!  If I am scaling like that I deserve to fail my clinical board!  I couldn't believe I had done that crappy of a job.  I felt terrible.  I just keep thinking that I am supposed to be getting better not worse!  Let's hope the last couple weeks of clinic go better.

We Survived!

Ok, so boards are over and think we all survived!  What a week!  I was the worst mother this week.  My nerves were riding so close to the surface that I snapped at the slightest misdeed by my children.  I also had so many plans to accomplish things around my house and projects for school, but very few of them happened.  Thursday finally came to take the Local Anesthesia Clinical Board.  My peer pal was my patient.  I realize I should have just used Kristie from the very beginning.  I had done injections on her so many times during the fall and knew her landmarks well, but I didn't use her.  I had used my peer pal for mock boards.  I failed the PSA for mock boards because I was too far posterior.  Well, for real boards, I did the PSA on the right instead of the left like mock board.  I had never given the PSA on her right side.  Her maxillary tuberosity was HUGE!  I could have sworn that I was right by her distal buccal root of the 2nd molar, but I hit osseous 3 times, meaning that I failed the PSA.  So crappy!  But Kristie was my back up and I nailed the PSA the second time.  $120 later I had passed the Local Anesthesia Clinical Board.

Saturday, March 17th (St. Patrick's Day) was my Hygiene Clinical Board.  I was allowed into the clinic at 11:45.  I immediately got my patient on the Chief Examiner's form to get her back to the examiners.  She was taken back, but didn't return to me for around 40 minutes.  I expected being the first to have my patient go back that she would back to me faster.  Karlie's patient came back sooner than mine, which freaked me out because it made me feel that mine wasn't going to be accepted.  Panic ensued!  A few minutes later she came around the corner.  Now the panic could start because I need to do my very best.  Well, I proceeded to make some time consuming mistakes.  I didn't check out the tray when she brought it back.  I didn't have my pen barriered for recording my probe readings.  I waited until I had 12 minutes left to probe.  I felt like the first hour went swimmingly.  The last hour FLEW!  I couldn't believe how fast that time went.  It felt like one minute I had an hour, the next I had 12 minutes left.  I really started to scramble at the end.  Every time I would explorer around her teeth I would feel a slight roughness that I just couldn't remove.  But time was up so I had to go with it.  While using indirect vision, my hand was shaking horribly while probing!  I know that I did the very best that I could, but I did get her to check out 1 minute late.  Not the end of the world unless I score a 75 and then still miss that 1 point.  I felt really good yesterday when I came home.  I felt utter relief at being done.  I don't know how to feel about the job I did other than I did my best.  Some of the other girls were saying that the examiners only select 8 spots not 12.  I would be absolutely relieved if that is true.  I will ask Alexander tomorrow in class.  I really should have tried harder with my sequencing.  I felt like I just kind of went all over in my quadrant.  I should have started anteriors and worked my way distal.  SEQUENCING!  So important for time saving.  I just hope that what I did was sufficient and pray that none of us have to relive that experience!  We are done girls!  And WE SURVIVED!

Thank You

To My Dear Friends,
I just wanted to say thank you to all those that helped me in clinic this morning.  So many of you played a role in helping me get to my grandpa's funeral on time.  First of all, thanks to Kristie who hung out with me for 4 1/2 hours on Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.  You were a rock star and I had so much fun talking with you.  You made the time pass by so much faster.  I wish you could have stayed all night.  It was much easier staying awake with you than with Trevor.  He fell asleep while we were watching a movie.  Next, thanks to Michelle for driving me to clinic so many days.  You are so awesome leaving your house early to come get me.  Thanks to McCall for recording my probe readings on my board patient and setting up a radiology room.  Thanks to Sam for getting my board stuff put into my tote for me.  Thanks to those that teamed together and printed my x-rays for boards.  I am grateful to Prof. Perry for doing all he could to get me out of clinic.

Love,
Sarah

Perry also showed me exactly what I will need to do to remove the calculus on the distal surface of #18.  I had missed one spot on the distal of #31.  It was a significant chunk of calculus, but he took the Nevi in a horizontal stroke and it came right off.  You can bet I will do that on the day of the board.  Here is wishing all of us GOOD LUCK on our boards next week.  I am terrified and happy at the same time.

We Left The VA Before 3 PM!!!!

Oh, today was such a wonderful day!  I had two patients in the morning and none in the afternoon.  I had 4 quads of a class V, a pano, BWX, 2 PAs, passed off the subgingival irrigation PE, and placed Arestin.  On top of everything I have hooked my 4 VA buddies on crocheting.  I spent part of our lunch teaching them how to crochet.  What a wonderful hobby I have them "hooked" on.  Do you get it?  Hooked?  Crochet hook.  Oh, never mind!  Lame attempt at being funny.  I had a terrible headache after lunch, so I was more than happy to not have a patient in the afternoon.  My four friends did a great job of getting finished with their patients super early.  So, I just played the role of clinical assistant in the afternoon and got everyone's rooms cleaned so that we could go home.  We were out of there before 3 pm and home by 3:35!  Now this day has set the standard of what we are going to shoot for every VA day.  Our group also has only 2 VA days left!  You bet I am counting down!  I can't wait to not have to leave at 6:45 in the morning to be down there by 7:30.  I will never work in an office in SLC.  I love the convenience of working close to home.  Let's just hope one of the dentists by me is hiring in May.  Something I learned from today was that I need to take advantage of my air.  I have gotten out of the habit of using my air to check for supragingival calculus.  I missed one tiny spot on the straight lingual of 25.  I must remember to do that especially with boards coming up in about 2 weeks!  YIKES!

An Interesting Week

This week started out a little bizarre.  Early Sunday morning I had a grand mal seizure that landed me in the ER for about 4 hours.  I got a new cell phone on Saturday and obviously spent too much time playing it through out the day.  Just second after turning off the light at 12:15 Sunday morning I went into my seizure.  I have been fine since except for my short term memory.  I still had to take the Process of Care exam on Tuesday.  I was ever so grateful that I had already taken the national board.  I don't think I remember anything that I studied for that exam.  When I entered the testing center on Tuesday, I put my license in my right back pocket of my jeans.  When I left the testing center I don't remember what I did with my license.  It may have fallen out of my pocket for all I know.  But it is officially gone.  I called the testing center and they don't have it.  I didn't even realize it was gone until the next day buying tickets to a movie.  So, I will be going to the DLD tomorrow to get a new drivers license.

This week was also our third and final mock board.  I was a little nervous because it has been more than a week since I have scaled and I had a seizure during that time.  I just prayed that I remembered what I was doing.  I was unable to confirm my patient.  She is a Midtown patient and speaks mostly Spanish.  I left her a message, but she never returned my call.  Thank heaven she was in the afternoon, because that gave me the opportunity to talk to Midtown and she had been in the day before and remembered that she was coming in to see me.  WaHoo!

She showed up and I was able to convince her to let me get her numb.  I was so thankful!  She was wonderful to work on.  I felt like things were going really well.  Then I hear Michelle, right across from me say, "I am going to let you have a little break and then I will check again."  Perfect!  I will do the same.  I scaled a little longer, then allowed my fingers to have a break.  When I got back in her mouth, I found a huge chunk of calculus that I hadn't felt before.  I was so glad for Michelle's reminder to let my hands have a break.  I would have missed an area otherwise.  I had a very good mockboard experience.  I only missed one probe depth.  It made me realize that I need to make sure my angulation on my probe isn't too shallow, which can lead to a false reading.  I will do better next time.  But I got a 98.75%!  Can't complain about that!

Also, Mr. Salomon finally got a hold of my board patient.  He scheduled her for next Thursday so that I can clean the right half of her mouth.  I already had a patient scheduled there, but this woman is my priority until after boards.  I only have two clinic days before board week, and I want to see her so that I can confirm my Board time with her and get her permission ahead of time to get her numb.  Here's to hoping that I pass my local anesthesia board so that I can get her numb!

Oh How I Hope Brooke is Right

Thank you for your kind words, Brooke!  I really needed that.  Right now I feel so inadequate and afraid that I am not going to do well.  I keep wondering if it possible for someone who has as much training as me to fail every single board exam!  I have to keep those thoughts out of my head.  I have got to stay positive.  I do hope that my brain will be able to select the most accurate answer.  I have this constant pit in my stomach and I feel like I want to cry all the time.  I just can't wait for it to be over.  It will be such a relief to know that I have one more down and only 3 to go.  I know that we all are going to amazing!  We are amazing people and we work with the best, so how could we not pass, right?  I have prepared my whole life for this!  Let's get this bad boy over with.  I am not studying any more for the National Board.  I know that nothing will stick at this point any way!  So, why waste my time?  I am going to have a nice evening.  The boys are sleeping over at their cousins house.  I am going to do something I haven't done in a long time.  Lay back and enjoy a movie!  Pass the popcorn, please!

At least I learned something

Today was LA mock board.  Everything went fine.  I passed my IA injection, but failed the PSA.  This was the advice that I received.  According to Prof. Alexander, my angles for the PSA were spot on, text book perfect!  That was the great news.  Next came the bad news.  I was too posterior, which meant that I wasn't in the buccal mucosa.  If I had just come forward a little more, I would have passed.  Next time I do a PSA I will practice on the right to see if I feel more comfortable with that.  All of the instructors said they did a left IA and right PSA.  I may need to do that.  I wanted to keep the anesthesia on one side of my patients mouth.  It is more important that I pass than only numb only the right or left side.  She also advised my on being a little too high on the IA and I needed to insert my needle a little more.  My patient was great!  She had wonderful anatomy for injections.  She told me that in her opinion, I did a great job and that the injections didn't even hurt.  I felt like it was a really good experience and so grateful that my instructors allow us that opportunity to learn.

I also had an interesting afternoon.  My patient was a 16 year old girl.  I was hoping that her mother would be cool with me doing a pano.  I just needed one more conventional pano to complete that requirement.  Mom said that was fine, but she wanted me to take bitewings as well.  I told her that she really didn't need them since it hadn't been a year since the last ones were taken, but she really wanted to have them taken.  I find the right pano film and get two loaded into the pano sleeve, put the lead apron on my patient and take the panos.  Once they are developed, I realize the huge mistake I have made.  I had the thyroid collar around her neck and it showed up in the film, blocking out most of her lower anteriors.  I load what I think is another two pano films into the sleeve and take the x-ray.  I go to develop them and find that I have put 3 panos inside the sleeve!  I couldn't believe it.  Just doing the x-rays took me nearly 45 to an hour.  I was so frustrated with myself.  The first pano came out and I couldn't see which side was left or right.  Next one came out, perfect.  Third one came out, too light!  The first two will do just fine, thank you very much.  I learned something today.  So.... that makes it a good day.  Now I need to study for the next 6 hours and another 5 hours tomorrow to prepare the national board that I am taking on Saturday.  I hope that it isn't a mistake taking it so soon.  I feel so unprepared, but I am hoping that I will feel better tomorrow.  I vow that I am not going to study from 2 pm Friday afternoon on.

Wish me luck!!!!

Odds and Ends

I do have some good news.  I found a board patient!  I am so relieved by this.  That was something that I was really worrying about and to know that she is reliable.  She came in the last clinic day of January.  My peer pal cleaned her upper right quad for her board and passed with 100%.  The left side of her mouth was left incomplete.  This was good for me.  Her upper left quad has at least 10 solid clicks and I will add #18 and 19 to fulfill the last couple of clicks.  She doesn't speak English, but if my peer pal could do it, so can I.  I will also be cleaning the rest of her mouth for requirements.  She is a class III!  Right now I have 30 quads of a class III, so I am getting close with my requirements there.  I thought I was going to have a mockboard patient, but the guy won't get back with me.  He canceled the night before the last mockboard due to family issues, which I understand.  Well, I thought he would have been willing to come in for this last one.  I just wish he would let me know either way.  That way I know if I need to start calling people for screenings on Friday.

I have a couple of stresses on my mind right now.  This Thursday we have our local anesthesia mock board.  At the end of clinic on Thursday we talked about what is expected for LA mockboard.  I went home sweating out of sheer terror!  I haven't given injections since my first VA day back from Christmas.  I will review the injections, depths, penetration sites and what to say.  Hopefully all goes well.

I am also taking my national board this Saturday.  I have just spent today studying for 6 1/2 hours.  Am I finished studying for the day, you ask?  Oh, no I am not.  I will probably hit the books for a couple more hours tonight.  I did feel good after my study session today, though.  I hope that I continue to feel more and more confident over the next couple of days.

My husband asked me tonight if it was a prerequisite for getting into the dental hygiene program to have a lack of confidence and constantly question my abilities.  I told him yes, because I know that each of us has uncertainties and questions ourselves.  Maybe during the interview process, they could smell it on us.  I know that I tried to come off as confident, but maybe I wasn't confident at all and that was just what they were looking for.  An insecure person lacking self confidence.  All fingers point to me!

Am I A Flirt or Just Friendly?

Well, I guess somebody thought I was a little flirty with Dr. Vanderbeek at the VA today.  I am a little embarrassed that the way I was talking to him was perceived as being flirty.  Sam tried to reassure me that I wasn't being flirty and I didn't think I was being flirty, but I will let you decided.  Dr. Vanderbeek came into do an exam on my AM patient.  He did a head and neck exam and tried to throw his gloves in the garbage can.  He missed.  I went around, picked them up, and put them in the trash.  The doctor told me I didn't need to get them and that he would have gotten them.  I said, "It's not like I'm doing any thing else."  Then I joked about him making my area messy.  I then made a comment about how I thought he would have been better at basketball given his height.  We joked back and forth for about 30 seconds and it was over.  I then proceeded to talk to my patient about his kids and where they go to school.  At the end of the day I find out my instructor asked Sam if I was married because I was being "flirty" with Dr. Vanderbeek.  Well, I guess if I get asked out by Dr. Vanderbeek next week at the VA we will know that I was being a little too friendly!  I will keep you posted if he does.

It is what it is.

I can't say more than that.  Last night at 5:45, my mock board patient canceled and I was left scrambling to find someone to fill his place.  I realize that he had a legitimate reason for not being able to come, but it still sucked.  The first person I called off of my list was willing to come.  He is such a sweet, old man!  I was so grateful for his willingness to come in within 14 hours of me calling him.  The unfortunate thing was that I hadn't looked to see if he had enough calculus to qualify for the board.  So, I was basically going into to it not knowing if my patient would qualify.  Prof. Alexander told me that the most important thing was to have a patient in my chair.  If they didn't qualify, then I would get 10 points below the lowest score in my group of students.  I was sure praying that everyone would do well, so that my score didn't go too low.  So, needless to say, he didn't qualify.  He was a class III with deep pockets and lots of supragingival calculus, but the subgingival calculus wasn't distinctive enough.  I had cleaned half of his mouth last week, and so I just cleaned the other 2 quadrants today.  I finished him in plenty of time before my check out time.  I had two small areas that I missed.  Prof. Alexander told me that I may have had my instrument too far into the interproximal area.  She came and watched me use more of the toe of the instrument to pop it off.   I got him finished up, he paid for the appointment, and I was free to clean up my room.  It is what it is because I couldn't change the fact that my other patient canceled and that my other one didn't qualify.  If this had been real boards, I would have been screwed royally.  But it was just for the experience and it was a good one.

The one thing that made me feel a little better, was Prof. Alexander came over and showed me what my score would have been had the calculus been more substantial.  I would have passed.  Like I said, that made me feel a LITTLE better.

While I was the student examiner, my group took a mock written LA exam.  I realized something that I needed to study was the brand names of the generic LAs.  I was really pleased with my score.  I got 45 out of 50.  I was able to (finally) schedule my written LA exam at Pearson VUE.  I am taking it this Monday at 6:45 pm.  I can't wait to have one of my exams out of the way.  I will have the next several days filled with studying and getting prepared.  I will take it and then start preparing for the national board.  It will give a little more than 2 weeks to prepare for that one.  Then 10 days later I take Process of Care.  It will be such a relief to have all of the exams that I have to study for over with by February 21st.  That will be a glorious day!

I Love Being CA

I know that some people really don't like being the CA, but I love it!  I really like Mr. Saloman and I think he likes me.  All day long he kept telling me what a great job I was doing.  He even asked if he could clone me.  I told him I didn't think my husband would like that very much.  I haven't been the CA at Weber since last spring and I loved being in the clinic with the girls I don't see as often.  I had a great day with you guys!  I hope I made clinic run smooth for you ladies.

My Thursday clinic was a pretty good day.  I had my first 1B of the semester.  I am still not as fast as I would like to be on simple cleanings.  I think my problem with him was that I kept going over and over certain areas because they felt rough.  Even Jen Wold checked some areas because they felt rough.  She came to the conclusion that it was just his dentition.  I now have 22 sets of bite-wing x-rays and 40 PAs.  I just need to have my parents come in for a full mouth series and I will be close with my PAs.  My afternoon patient was a class III in 3 quadrants and a class IV in the other.  Lots of calculus.  I used my triple bend and actually liked it today.  I have had bad experiences in the past, but it just reminded me that I need to keep trying something again and again.  This gentleman had several areas of 7, 8, and 9 mm pockets.  I didn't have any missed areas in the half of his mouth that I cleaned.  I felt really good about that.  Jen told me there was just a little bit of deposit supragingival on the distal line angle of 29.  I got in there, got it off, and half of his mouth was clean.  I also have 21 quadrants of a class III/IV.  They keep saying that the class IV patients will come.  I sure hope so because I still need an eaglesoft patient.

On Friday, I showed up at 8 am to do a screening on a patient that might qualify for boards.  Her appointment was at 8:30 am.  8:50 rolled around and she still hadn't shown up.  Mr. Saloman called her for me to find out that she had forgotten about the appointment.  I have her scheduled for Jan. 26th to do a screening.  I sure hope that she comes.  Looking at x-rays from a year ago, she has many spots of radiographic calculus that were never scaled by my peer pal.  If she doesn't qualify, I am going to be a little more stressed.  Needless to say, I showed up at 8 am for no reason.  I could have slept in a little.  Darn!  I did help the other girls by making charts and cleaning rooms, so it at least counts as service hours.

What a Way to Start...

I really feel like I had a good day for my first day back after Christmas break.  I got 8 quads of a class V and two quads of a class III and I got 6 injections!!!  WAHOO!  Our instructor at the VA is this nice girl that is 3 years younger than me, a little weird, and she told me that I did great with my injections.  That makes me feel really good since the last few times I have given injections, Hanson and Alexander have told me that I go way to fast and that I need to slow down.  Katie, the new instructor, did say to speed up my rate of deposition.  I guess I went from one extreme to the other.  Oh well.  At least I was getting some positive info about how I did on my injections.  I would have been perfect on my IA except that I forgot to move the syringe over the premolars.  Other than that, I was gold!  Here is to hoping for a great semester.  Now I just need to find my mock board patient for two weeks away and hopefully a board patient!  Cross your fingers for all of us girls that still need to find these patients.