Sleeping patients!

For most people a visit to the dentist is a nightmare. Coz as Ogden Nash put it "some tortures are physical while some are mental but the one that is both is dental." But have you ever wondered what a dentist's worst nightmare could be? A sleeping patient! Yes.

I happened to come come across a lot of them when I was posted in dept. of periodontics where patients come for cleaning. But most of the time it is more likely that they were just forced to get it done before a filling or an extraction. Hence they are least likely to be eager about it. And we being students happen to do mechanical cleaning inspite of great advancements like ultrasonic, etc. Now this is a time consuming procdure and can tire the patient to the max. In addition is the fact that our posting is in the afternoon and the patient most probably is waiting since morning for his turn probably without having lunch.

So it happens that the moment he sits on the chair he gets drowsy, and in no time he is asleep and sometimes even snoring! This puts me in a spot. I'm forced to wake them up because of fear of hurting them with sharp instruments. They wake up with a start out of guilt of dozin off assumin they are the only ones to have done it. But only we know that its an everyday happening! And after some time they are not even guilty, they are comfortably asleep. It was initially shocking and irritating but i gradually learnt what i had to learn- patient psychology.

This was one of my enjoyable experiences in college as i learnt more about psychology than about dentistry!!