Earlier today I had my regular scale and polish which turned out to be a close shave with the hygienist. I have this done every six months at the advice of my very nice and very expensive dentist. She says that no matter how well you brush or floss, you can’t get rid of all the plaque. Half way round something unexpected happened…..
Yes the hygienist was half way around in jet washing my teeth. I reckoned I was doing a fantastic job in not reacting in any way when the icy cold water hit a sensitive tooth, especially with her hand, jet wash gadget and a suction tube in my mouth.
She stopped abruptly, said something quietly to her assistant and without warning the chair was coming upright.
”Can you feel anything loose in your mouth, whatever you do don’t try and swallow”
At first I thought she must have dislodged a filling or something. Then she asked the assistant to unscrew the filter in the main stand to the high tech work station thingy (sorry, not sure what this is called).
The assistant unscrewed the filter and said there was nothing there. I even saw the round mesh was clear.
”Oh, are you sure nothing is in your mouth, have you swallowed, did you feel anything go down?” I was starting to feel a little concerned so I asked what was wrong. I ran my tongue around in my mouth, feeling my teeth and everything felt fine.
”The tip from my instrument has come off and I’m worried you’ve swallowed it. You might have to go to A&E”
She was worried. As an Asian lady, she went as white as her coat. So I reassured her by saying “I’m sure I would have felt something go down but everything feels fine to me. How big is it?”
”Oh it’s really quite small, there’s nothing to worry about. I have a spare to finish the rest of your teeth”. And so she continued. She was still looking worried and the assistant wouldn’t look me in the eye. I reiterated that I hadn’t felt anything at all, so perhaps the suction device had sucked it up after all.
Then she switched to business as usual. “Your teeth aren’t bad but you do need to pay more attention to that wisdom tooth at the back, in fact you can buy tooth brushes with extra long handles now”. I was wondering if this meant I had an extra large mouth.
I went downstairs, back to reception. I paid my £53 and booked another appointment for six months time. Having just blogged about complaining to the hospital and mulling over a formal complaint against my Doctor (for misdiagnosis) I wondered if I was turning into a serial complainer. With the hygienist, no complaint necessary, just a close shave and simply one of those things.