"Dentists and Dragons - Chapter 6" by Troy H. Cheek on Mar 26, 2005

(If you missed Part 5, go back and read it first!)

The story of the film so far: A bite into bad beef jerky revealed a weakness in a tooth, which decided to crack open. After months of wrangling with insurance companies and dentists, I finally got clearance to have a root canal treatment on tooth #31. Now that that was completed, it was time for the crown to protect what was left of my tooth.

I could have gotten a crown put on during my previous visit, but seeing as I was throwing infections at him every time he did any work on my mouth, Dentist #5 decided to wait a couple of days. I call him Dentist #5 because he's the 5th one I've gone to concerning this particular tooth. The first four didn't take my insurance, only did fillings, only pulled teeth, and didn't do crowns, respectively.

This time I did not develop an infection and was able to return for, I had been promised, the very last visit.

Of course, they started promising me that three or four visits ago.

The appointment was a 2:00PM so naturally I arrived at 1:30PM so as not to be considered a no-show under their bizarre policies. This time, showing up early simply meant that I had to wait longer, though in the past it has gotten me in as much as 15 minutes prior to my scheduled appointment time.

As this was to be "a simple fitting," I was surprised that I was getting another shot of Z-caine, or whatever they're calling novacaine nowadays, but I never turn down free drugs. I stared at the ceiling repeating "rubber baby buggy bumpers" until it became "blublur blaybly blubly blublers," at which time I knew the shot had taken hold.

Last visit, Dentist #5 had used some epoxy-looking gunk called Miracle Mix to sculpt a fair impression of a good biting surface. This first thing he did for this visit was to grind it away. The ground for a long time. He ground until I started seeing and smelling smoke, which I'm told is seldom a good thing when having dental work done. He didn't seem concerned, so I tried not to be concerned either.

I wasn't very good at it.

I got even worse at it when his assistant brought in what looked like two feet of dental floss. Dentist #5 made a little hangman's noose out of it and crammed it in my mouth, where he set to work with two metal hooks and a spatula. I eventually figured out that he was using the floss-like stuff to force my gums away from my tooth so that he could grind down below the gumline.

Once again, I wondered exactly what was left of my tooth. To do the root canal, he had drilled out most of the inner core of my tooth. To do the crown, he was drilling out most of the outer section. By my reckoning, there was very little of the original tooth left above the gumline, and he had just started drilling below the gumline. Yet this was called "saving the tooth."

This went on for what seemed like an hour. It could have seemed that way because of my cramped jaws, or the irrational expectation of pain, or because I was getting bored, or because the assistant was having brake problems on her car and the dentist was giving her really bad advice. What really made it seem like an hour, though, was the minute hand of the clock on the wall making a nearly complete revolution.

Drilling complete, and with my head still vibrating slightly, I had to make another impression. This, as I have described before, means biting down on a huge mass with the consistency of bubble gum and the flavor of engine degreaser. Once it hardened, they pried my jaws apart and went off to make a crown.

The assistant came back with a crown, which was the first thing stuck in my mouth to take the place of a tooth that actually looked like a tooth. "Bite down on that," she ordered. "All the way!"

"That is all the way," I snarled through clenched teeth.

"Oh," she replied, prying my mouth open and retrieving the crown. She drilled on it a while, rinsed it off, and had been try again. Drill, rinse, repeat. Finally, she announced that I was able to bite down all the way. I had to take her at her word, seeing as I still couldn't feel anything on that side of my mouth.

Dentist #5 came in, checked everything, and gave the assistant the go-ahead to glue that sucker down.

Finally, I thought, it's over!

"That went better than I'd hoped!" Dentist #5 bellowed, slapping me on the back and propelling me towards the checkout counter. "One more visit ought to do it!"

"One more?" I mumbled, feeling small and lost again.

"That's just your temporary crown!" he clarified. "We'll get the permanent crown back in a couple of weeks! We'll call you! And make sure you get back in right away. If you wait too long, and your mouth might change and it won't fit anymore!"

I paid, made sure that they had my home, work, and cellular phone numbers, and went home.

Weeks passed.

I checked the calendar and realized that it had been nearly three (3) weeks since my dentist had told me a couple of weeks. I generally consider "couple" to mean "roughly two," though I have known people to use it to mean three or four. I decided that if I didn't hear from them again in a day or two, I'd give them a call.

I was at work when my crazy brother called. He'd brought in the mail, mistakenly opened one of mine, and panicked. Then he realized that he hadn't had any dental work done lately and the letter was for me. Then he panicked again and called me. "It says here that you need to call immediately for an appointment," he said for the tenth time.

"Okay, as soon as I get off the phone with you."

"They're trying to rip you off, man!" he repeated for the seventh time. "It says in here - twice! - that they can't guarantee the fit if you wait more than 30 days. This form letter was mailed over a week ago. How long since you were fitted?"

"About three weeks."

"They're trying to rip you off, man!" Eight times. "I bet when you call, they'll tell you they can't get you in until next week, then it will be more than 30 days, and they're going to say the crown won't fit and you'll have to pay for another one!"

"I'm sure that they'd never do that. Now hang up so I can call them and set up an appointment."

He did. I did. I was thinking of having the number put on my speed dial, but before I got around to it, I had somehow memorized it due to sheer repetition.

"Thank you for calling... Oh, hi, Troy!" Likewise, they had memorized my number on the caller ID. "What can we do for you?"

"My crazy brother called and said you had sent me a letter (I thought you said you were going to call?) telling me my permanent crown was back and I need to call you to set up an appointment to have it put on. I free anytime this afternoon."

"Call for an appointment to put on a crown?" she said. "That's odd. He should have scheduled you for that when you were last here."

"How could he schedule me for an appointment when he didn't know how long it would take for that other company to get my permanent crown back to him?"

She ignored that. "Would Monday of next week be good for you?"

"Great for me, but isn't that a little late?"

"It's the earliest appointment time we have available."

I started having the feeling that my crazy brother was, in this particular instance, not quite so crazy as most people believed. "Dentist #5 stressed that it was vital to get back in to have this put on as soon as possible. '30 days' has been mentioned. It took over two weeks to get the crown back, over a week for you to get a letter to me, and now you're telling me that it will be almost a week before I can come in. Isn't that really pushing the '30 days' thing?"

"Well, sir, it's not our fault you waited so long to set up-"

"Now just hold it right there!" I interupted. "I called within ten minutes of receiving the letter, thanks to my crazy brother. Without breaking the laws of time and space, it is impossible for me to have called you any sooner to set up an appointment. Don't try to blame me for your mistakes."

"We didn't make any mist-"

"Dentist #5 told me that you would call me when the permanent crown came in. I made sure you had three (3) different phone numbers for me. As far as I'm concerned, you should have called me over a week ago and I should have been in the office that day or the next."

"Well, sir, sometimes I call and sometimes I send form letters."

"Why didn't you call me, instead of sending a form letter, since this crown was so time sensitive?"

Huff. "Sir, that's just the way it happened. I have to use the form letters sometimes. I have a job to do! I don't have time to spend all day on the phone talking to people about their appointments!"

"You're a receptionist! It's your JOB to spend all day on the phone talking to people about their appointments!"

Sniff. "Hold please."

Time passes.

"Mr. Cheek? This is the office manager. What did you say to make my receptionist cry like that?"

I repeated the whole '30 day' thing.

"Well, it'll be close, but if you come in Monday, your mouth shouldn't have changed enough for it to be a problem, what with that being a back tooth and all. And, tell you what, if we get a cancellation before then, we'll give you a call. Okay?"

"Well, okay."

Come Monday, I again showed up 30 minutes early and had to wait 45 minutes. The dental assistant showed me to my room. "Open up!"

I did. I had been assured that there was no need for pain killers during this visit, as we were simply popping off the temporary crown and cementig down the permanent one.

"Oh, it's a good thing you came in when you did. This temporary crown is getting loose. It could have fallen off at any time." She reached in and started pulling at the crown.

Ten minutes and a pair of plyers later, both of us sweating and gasping for breath, the temporary crown finally popped off.

"Well, let's get that cleaned up and ready for the permanent crown," she said cheerfully. Cleaning up consisted of scraping at my tooth to get rid of all the gunk which had been holding the temporary crown on. There was apparently a lot of it.

And it tasted funny.

But finally she finished and Dentist #5 came in, declared her finished, and gave her permission to test fit the permanent crown. "Bite down on that," she ordered. "All the way!"

"That is all the way," I snarled through clenched teeth.

"Oh," she replied, prying my mouth open and retrieving the crown. This time I could feel that my mouth wasn't closing all the way. But she decided that she'd let the dentist do the actual adjusting. We took a quick X-ray to make sure that the crown and the tooth were mating up properly. They were.

Then Dentist #5 came in and checked the placement. "Bite down on that," he ordered. "All the way!"

"That is all the way," I snarled through clenched teeth.

"Oh," he replied, prying my mouth open and retrieving the crown. Drill, rinse, repeat. At some point, the other dental assistant, the one which had fitted my temporary crown, was called in. For some reason, none of these dental professionals could understand why my permanent crown was a tad too high, though my temporary crown, made from the same impression, had also been a tad too high. Made perfect sense to me, but I'm not a dental professional.

Finally, everything fit, the crown was cemented into place, and I was declared good to go. Then the dental assistant came back in and had me sign the forms authorizing them to cement the crow into place.

"What else needs done?" she asked half to herself as she filled out the rest of the paperwork. "We probably need to schedule your next comprehensive exam. When did you have your last one?"

"I don't know," I answered. "I've never had one here."

"Say what? You've been coming here for months and you've never had your comprehensive exam? You should have had one of those the first time you came in!"

"The first time I came in to see Dentist #5, I was just looking for a second opinion before Dentist #3 extracted this tooth you just saved because, in his professional opinion, it was beyond saving. I got a 'problem specific consult' instead of a regular examination."

"Oh, well, let's schedule for one, then."

And we did.

And some day I'll tell you about it.

Copyright 2005 by Troy H. Cheek. Reprint with prior written permission only. Comments and questions to