Doctors

The Real Truth About Dentistry

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An intriguing long form piece appears in the May 2019 issue in Atlantic titled “The Truth About Dentistry: It’s much less scientific—and more prone to gratuitous procedures—than you may think,” written by Ferris Jabr, see https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/05/the-trouble-with-dentistry/586039/. This article has a lot of people talking including dentists, physicians, and patients who have experience with dentists throughout the Internet on forums and Twitter (see https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/forums/topic/the-truth-about-dentistry-critical-longform-piece-in-the-atlantic/). The main shortcoming with this article in the Atlantic is it relies on an anecdotal story which forms the basis of the entire article. There are several themes to the article that will be discussed below along with additional themes not mentioned that are involved to form the real truth about dentistry. 1. Dentistry is a Business and some Dentists, just like in other Professions, are Bad Apples. The article describes a dentist Lund who overtreats patients … Read more

Important Studies on Opioid Prescribing: Implications for Dentistry

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Recently on this site several articles have appeared discussing opioid prescribing after wisdom teeth removal see for example the posts Do Oral Surgeons Give Too Many Opioids for Wisdom Teeth Removal? and Opioid Prescriptions From Dental Clinicians for Young Adults and Subsequent Opioid Use and Abuse. Very recently several interesting studies regarding opioid prescribing have published. The first study is titled “Trends in Opioid Prescribing for Adolescents and Young Adults in Ambulatory Care Settings” written by Hudgins et al. appearing in Pediatrics in June 2019 (vol.143, no. 6, e20181578). The article explored opioid prescribing for adolescents (ages 13 to 17) and young adults (ages 18 to 22) receiving care in emergency departments and outpatient clinics. Data from the National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NHAMCS) and National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey (NAMCS) over the time period from January 1, 2005, … Read more

A Counseling Model for Dental Students

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An interesting article titled “The Embedded Counseling Model: An Application to Dental Students” written by David Francis Adams appears in the January 2017 edition of the Journal of Dental Education (vol. 81, no. 1, pp. 29-35). The article discusses a study performed at the University of Iowa College of Dentistry to study the impact of a counseling program. The study was motivated by prior studies that have shown that high rates of stress, anxiety, and mood problems are prevalent among dental students and and can lead to health issues and substance abuse. Similar types of issues were previously addressed in the post titled Designing a Predoctoral Dental Curriculum To Help With Therapy Issues such as Stress Management and Suicide Prevention. In the article, at the University of Iowa collaboration occurred between the dental school and the university counseling service that … Read more

How Can Dentists Better Set Expectations About their Career Choices to Avoid Couples Therapy?

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Dentists these days are graduating with ever increasing amounts of debt as a result of loans needed to graduate from dental school. This topic has been covered before on this site such as in the post Will Dental School Debt Lead to Future Counseling?. Such debt may take a heavy toll on dentists and the patients they serve. One way debt from dental school can adversely impact a dentist is in his or her romantic relationships. This is touched on in the post Divorce and Dentistry: Repairing Broken Relationships. In this post one of the common contributors to divorce for dentists is their spouse not having clear expectations about work and finances. A new dentist may take many years of paying down debt before there is money left over for nice houses and fancy vacations. Perhaps if the spouse or … Read more

Divorce Among Dentists and Physicians: Is More Couples Therapy Needed?

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An interesting article titled “Divorce among physicians and other healthcare professionals in the United States: analysis of census survey data,” by Ly et al. appearing in BMJ (350: h706; 2015) discusses some rates of divorce among physicians and dentists compared with other professions in the United States of America. The authors were motivated to perform the work because it has been speculated that long hours and unpredictable work hours often worked by doctors leads to more divorces. In the study the authors looked at data by the US Census Bureau from 2008 to 2013. The data included age, sex, race, current marital status, occupation, annual income, and weekly hours usually worked. The authors included only those who were ages 25 or greater. Physicians, dentists, pharmacists, nurses, lawyers, and healthcare executives were identified based on a self reported occupation. The sample included … Read more