Thread: Workplace Diplomacy...

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Why didn't you report him to the authorities if his competency is in question?

The reason is because the sad truth is that the dentist easily gets out of these kind of cases. All they have to do is to bring you up before a board of inquiry and ask if you are qualified to make a diagnosis of carious lesions within teeth. Technically, only a dentist can make a clinical diagnosis so it's one of those things that unless another dentist is present and watching him work, there's nothing that can be done....sad. Now after watching first hand several thousand times, I can see and tell what is going on in a tooth, but to the California Dental Board I'm an idiot because I don't have the title DDS behind my name.

so what's an "oh-when"?

Lol....he was asking for an 'oven' which is where part of the miscommunication came from. The gutta percha (rubber points used to fill the area where the roots used to be) need to be heated using one of a few methods. One technique is to place the points into a heating device to warm them up prior to placing them. On top of the thick accent that made it hard to understand what he wanted, the term of oven is not the best term for the device. The term most commonly used is obturator.