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After the last final of second year, a relaxing weekend, and some heavy duty sleep (well, as much as can be expected with two kids), we started our transition into the clinics. We have two new classes this summer I block, as well as a continuation of our complete dentures class. The two new classes are Treatment Planning and Introduction to Clinics.
Treatment planning is pretty straight forward and needs no description. Intro to clinics is where we hear from each department and learn about all the different protocols and paperwork that we need to be filling out and how each department runs. Example: pedodontics is different than perio. Maybe this is what the girl on the elevator I talked to during my interview meant when she said, “Don’t come here, it is too compartmentalized”, but who knows and who cares, I like it so far. This is also the class where we assist the upperclassman twice in each department. Twice in fixed, twice in removable, twice in…etc. So far this has been a great experiance. The majority of the upperclassman are great sports and let us go along for the ride, ask them silly questions, and suck saliva from their gracious patients.
Our main requirement right now is the 14 assists. We are also returning for a day in the preclinic where we are prepping a couple of ivorine teeth. I think a class I lesion and an MO. We are also going to be doing some root planing and scaling on each other.
We also have duty days in Admissions and Oral Surgery. These classes go for about another month. After that, we get assigned our first patients! Anxious and nerve wracking!