So Close and Yet so Far Away

I can't believe I have less than a month left of school.  This is my last month of school for most likely forever.  Thinking that we only have one month left of school seems so soon and yet I feel like it is so far away because I still have so many requirements to do (14 quads of a 3, 2 kids, 17 injections, and several PEs).  I have been working as hard as I can to kick in gear and get everything done as fast as I can. 

This morning I finished my board patient.  Finally!  Perry didn't feel anything in the quad that I cleaned for boards.  I almost jumped for joy when he said that.  However, I left a boulder sized piece of calculus on the quad I cleaned today.  It was on the distal of 2.  I seriously don't know how I missed it.  Perry had me sit at about 10 o'clock to get it off with my Gracey.  Sitting in that position and doing a finger assist with my Gracey was awesome!  I love learning knew things, using what I've learned, and then be effective with it. 

In the afternoon I thought my patient hadn't been to the dentist in 10 years.  Turns out it had only been 10 months since his last cleaning... bummer.  He ended up being a V, but he was really nice.  I was able to give him some really good OHI, which made me feel really good.  He was one of those patients who reminded me that I want to be a hygienist because I want to help people (during school I forget sometimes that I'm practicing to be a real hygienist.  It's just not about requirements). 

Good luck to everyone for finishing the last month!

No Patients and Yet Productive

So, yesterday I called people, but no one could come in... no one!  I felt pretty depressed when I went to bed last night about the situation, but when I woke up I decided I would make today a productive day.  The best about my decision was that it actually happened.  I passed off my air/powder polish PE on Stefanie (major thanks to her!) and did a sealant on her.  Krisite was also kind enough to share her patient with me so that I could do sealants on him and pass off my Sealant PE on him.  Then Karlie did 2 sealants on me.  I love having my sealants done.  Karlie was also kind enough to scale around my lower anteriors too.  She did an awesome job.  I also got my board stuff together.  I used to be able to talk about boards like they were a few years away, but now I have to get in the mindset that they are NEXT week.  A week from today I will be doing my LA clinical and then my patient clinical the next day.  It was also fun to talk to everyone else who didn't have patients, which was about half the clinic.  I'm glad that the morning worked out so well.

Sam was kind enough to let me see the father of the two kids that she was seeing.  Kristie ended up seeing the mom.  I was definitely blessed today since everything worked out so well.  My patient was a class V and  a nice guy.  I was able to get his HH, OD, and scale in an hour.  I just have to do x-rays on him and then we will be done.  (He had to go pick up his other child for Sam to clean.)  I am so glad I have such great friends in the program who look out for me. 

FYI - I finally made up my half of a clinic day from the first of the semester on Tuesday.  My patient was a 1B.  The exciting part of the day was being able to give Karlie N.'s patient 3 injections (thanks Karlie!).  I was so glad that I got to practice before next week, especially on her patient because her patient didn't have the best landmarks.  I feel pretty confident about giving injections. 

Running Out of Titles

Now that we are on the down hill slope of the semester I am having a hard time coming up with creative titles for my blog (obviously).  Let's start with the VA on Tuesday.  I got a total of 4 quads between my two patients for the day.  At least one of those quads was a class 3 and I passed off two PEs.  I feel a sense of urgency all of a sudden to pass off as many PEs as fast as I possibly can.  My morning patient was such a nice guy.  He said yes mam or no mam to everything I asked him.  My afternoon patient only had a few lower teeth.  He is in the process of getting a full upper denture and a partial for the lower.  I was able to pass off my Desenitizing PE and Oraqix on him because of a tooth that was sensitive.  It was awesome to be able to get both of those done.  I am surprised with how well that Colgate desensitizing paste works.  After I polished it on he said that he was not sensitive anymore.  I now like and plan on using that paste more.  Both of my patients also made a comment about "this is where all the pretty ladies are" when they came back to the chair.  That has nothing to do with learning, but it's something that I want to remember.  Ha ha.
Now for clinic, which I am still presently in (I finished my patient a while ago and am now searching for things to do to keep me busy).  I saw my board patient this morning and I cleaned her upper left quad.  I couldn't do anything else because I'm saving the UR and LR for boards.  There was a piece of calculus that I could not get off, but thankfully Alexander was kind enough to come help me.  We had to throw everything we had at it.  After having difficulty with that spot it made me nervous about how board day is going to go.  I plan on using all of the strategies that Alexander has shown me so that I can do well on it.  One of the best tips that I learned from Alexander was a good horizontal stroke.  Actually, it's not just a horizontal stroke.  It's a horizontal stroke with a twist, literally.  Alexander will do a horizontal stroke and follow the tooth around the line angle as she does the stroke.  I love learning new tips like that one that will help me be successful.  Well, now that I have blogged I guess I better go find something else to do.  Have a great day everyone!