Oh Jon!!
You are not being treated properly. They are flipping you from one "gem" to another and they are not suppose to do that. Temporary teeth in most cases, should resemble what the permanent teeth are going to look like. When doing dentures, the temporaries will look somewhat different than the permanent but it is imperative that the temporaries fit perfectly into your bite or they will alter your bite and the permanent teeth won't fit properly.
There is no reason for your temporary teeth or new permanent teeth to look differently than your natural teeth did when they were healthy. Do you know what I mean? Nothing should be noticably out of balance from one side to the other and your upper teeth should be straight without any ledge anywhere. The only reasons why you would see a noticable difference are:
1) Your jaw is not lined up properly and your bite is crooked. But this would have been noticable to you with your natural teeth.
2) The implants are not placed properly and to accomodate them, the shape of your teeth had to be changed.
3) The idiot does not know what he is doing!!
I hate to say this but, your case is typical of what I have seen done in dental school clinics. It amazes me how this nonsense gets past those in charge...... but it does, all the time!
I think it would behoove you to get an opinion from a "real" dentist outside of the clinic before you proceeded any further. I know you are concerned about the finances, but at what expense are you putting yourself through this? An opinion outside of the school may help you to sort through all of the nonsense.
I am so sorry you are enduring such a difficult time. This is truly so unfair to you. There has got to be a patient advocate for the patients at the clinic.... if not, then the state dental board may be the place to talk to someone about all of this.
Bryanna
Quote:
Originally Posted by jon
If anyone is following this, please refer back to the last thread.
At my Monday, May5,appointment, the pros intern spent much time putting in, reshaping, etc, my temporary denture for my lower teeth. I don't believe I've ever seen worse proportions. The curve from the front teeth to the back is almost out of sight on one side. Looks normal on the other. My original teeth were bad but didn't look as bad as these do. Okay, they're temporary, but I hate to see his work on the permanent ones.
Also, the tops of the front 6 teeth roll back toward my throat. The teeth are not straight teeth. There's a ledge I feel with my tongue. That's vague, but does anyone understand what I mean? Are temps supposed to look unbalanced like that and curve backwards instead of being straight?
When I looked at them and asked why, he said it was just temporary - not to worry about it - that I couldn't expect them to look any differently.
Pros intern doesn't want me to have my upper bridge on implants. Says there's just a cavity on one of the canine teeth that are the anchors. My feelings about not doing that much work on a decayed tooth are not valid according to him. Wants to use my teeth whether I want implants as insurance against future work or not.
He sent me down to surgery for an opinion. Another totally new intern who looks 16 said that in his opinion, I should use my canine teeth again as anchors for the front bridge. That they're strongest teeth in my head, and one little cavity isn't going to make any difference. I asked him when he'd spoken to pros intern. He eered and ahhed and said a little while ago, but that it didn't influence him.
Then he started saying that because I'd had this present bridge as my front teeth for so long (over 40 years ) that the gum had narrowed toomuch to put inplants in, so that was that. That if I got anyone to do it, they'd have to graft bone in front and wait for that to heal - like 6-9 months. My sentence has been decided by a new grad who is with the other class coming into all the departments this week.
The patient advocate said she was only supposed to work as advocate between students and patients - not interns and up. Therefore, there is no patient advocate in the dental clinic.
I went to the dean's office. She was too busy to see me for several weeks or months. Doesn't matter, she's been briefed and the word has been put out that I'm a trouble maker.
Bryanna, if you read this, I have acted the way you suggested from the beginning. I haven't threatened, been ugly, blamed anyone. I've just told them what had happened to me. No one has given me answers to anything.
They're playing dirty.
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