LET IT BEGIN

This week was the first official week of school. I went to the VA clinic on Tuesday. We spent most of the day going through clinic orientation. I was supposed to see a patient in the afternoon but when he showed up he had a new cold sore and I was told to have him rescheduled.
Today we had our first day of clinic at WSU. We practiced exploring on each other and passed off our instrument sharpening PE. Overall I feel like has been a good start to the semester.

Done

I finished the last quad on my class three pt today. I took me the whole entire clinic time. Her calculus is so hard. In one spot on the distal of #2 I couldn't get it off so I asked a 2 year student who is a TA for help. She couldn't get it so I asked Prof. Costley for help. She helped me get a little but we still couldn't get it all. When Instructor Hafen did my scale check I told her about it and she tried and said it was "concrete." We ended up having to leave it because it wouldn't come off. It was crazy. I am done with all my clinic requirements now.
On a different not my dad was buried yesterday in a military cemetery clear down by the point of the mountain. The service was short and then we spent much of the rest of the day with family from out of town. I was nice to get to know some of my relatives better. I am not really sure what to write about my feelings, but I feel like I am coping a little better each day and slowly moving on.

Rough Day

My father passed away late Saturday night. I thought that I was dealing with everything ok and that my crying was over. However, when I went to tell professor Costley I couldn't hold back the tears. I wasn't sure when the burial was going to be and Ryan (my brother) had said probably on Wednesday. Because I might not be there for the last day of clinic I asked Prof Costley to come in a watch me pass off my last three PE's because the instructors on Mondays are always short on time. She said she would be happy too and told me that I could go home if I wanted and that I didn't have to come all week. I figured it best to stay rather than go home and sulk. I cleaned two quads on my class III pt today. I missed a bunch of spot though. Other than the fact that I passed off some PE's it was a really rough day. The funeral ended up being tonight. My dad didn't look like himself laying there. It was nice to hear some of the things that people had to say about him. His burial is scheduled for tomorrow. Today was a really rough day. Dad I will miss you!

I quad of Class III

My class III came agian today. I was able to retake the needed x-rays, do a complete OD and scale 1 quad. She has very tenacious calculus. It is so tough. Her health history said she has never been to the dentist. Instructor Hemsley did my scale check and she could not even get one of the places I missed because the calculus was just too hard. I passed off a couple PE's today so all I have left are three instrumentation PE's which I will do next week. I almost forgot. Kim Also let me take a full mouth this morning on her pt. That means I will meet my x-ray requirements for the semester.

ULTIMATE FRUSTRATION

My class III pt was supposed to come today. Clinic started at 8 and she didn't show. I and Mr. Salomon kept calling and calling and finally Mr. Salomon got a hold of her and got her to come in. She showed up at 10:15, pt walk out is 10:30. I took a full mouth on her with scan-x and at the end had a bunch of instructors in the x-ray room trying to help me get done because we were out of clinic time and there was a lady coming to present on ultrasonic scalers to our class. I was in such a rush. I didn't realize that I needed a FMX 20 template and not the 18. I clicked on the FMX 18 and scanned in my x-rays. Because I had filled the template two of the x-rays wouldn't fit and got lost. Mr. Salomon saved one but it was a duplicate of one I already had. I had no time to do retakes and was told I would have to do them at her next appointment. I gave my pt a talking to through her daughter who translated and told her that she had an infection in her mouth and that I had given her all of my last available appointments for the semester and that if the infection was not treated she could eventually loose teeth. I told her if she didn't come to her appointments she could not get back in until fall because we are closed in the summer. She understood and hopefully she will come next time. After the guest speaker I had to hang around and transfer all of the x-rays one by one into a FMX 20 template. What a pain. but it is set up now for me to finish the needed retakes next time. What a frustrating day.

Denture PE

Today i had my grandpa come in so that I could clean his denture and pass off my denture PE. His health history was so long it took me over an hour to look everything up and write it all down. But I passed off my PE and then I saw Christina's son again and cleaned all four quads in his mouth. It was a good day.

Finished my IA requirements

Today I saw a little boy who had calculus plastered all over the facial and lingual surfaces of 24 & 25. You couldn't even see the crown of the tooth. His mom told me that his teeth came in that way and that a dentist had told her that the only way to fix them was to crown or veneer them. He did have slight enamel hypoplasia on them but most of the nasty looking stuff was calculus. So they probably didn't come in that way. They would have only come in with the enamel hypoplasia. I scaled it all off and showed his mom. She was so happy. I was supposed to see his sister too but ran out of time because Stephanie and I sealed some of his teeth. Luckily Lauren had a pt cancel in the afternoon and she was able to get the sister in later in the day. I apologized to the mom and said I was sorry that I ran out of time and that I really thought that I would have enough time to see them both when I originally scheduled them. She was fine with the fact that I spent more time on her son and was just so happy that the calculus was gone and his teeth looked so much better. She kept telling me that she didn't know it was that bad and that she really thought that it wouldn't come off. She was really happy with the cleaning her son got. The good thing is that I hung out for the afternoon to see if I could take any x-rays at midtown and got to finish my sealant requirements on his sister that Lauren saw. I also took 1 PA on Mr. Salomon but that was all the x-rays I did in the afternoon.