The May Project

Life has been stressful this yr, and after my occasional down times, I decided to monitor my daily mood for 1 month to see whether there is a pattern to it.

heres the graph

From the data, I couldn't come into any conclusion regarding the pattern

Even weekends varied from each other depending on whether I did anything productive.

When looking at the date individually, I'm largely affected by the days with clinics and the mood could spike either way

Lastly I need to come up with a better way to analyse this cos what I found out was...

that life is the sum of glorious and disappointing moments

At the end of the day, its very hard to assess my mood with extremely shit morning and an inspirational afternoon. Do I give an ok for that day?

There is no pattern. Mood fluctuated a lot so I dun tend to stay depressed for long which is a ++

It's magic

It was....
the great simplicity of Wes Brown,
the leadership of Ferdinand,
the persistence of Hargreaves,
the courage of Anderson,
the composure of Giggs,
the goal from Ronaldo,
the spirit of Tevez,
the save from Van der sar,
Drogba's red card from Vidic,
and the magic of the post + crossbar + John Terry

Fare evasion

U can say whatever u want but in the end, dentistry is still a business. Dentists still need to pay bills and kids' school fees.

So when patients come in, we normally inform them of the cost and ask them to pay on the day.
Of course sometimes u get dodgy ppl coming in, getting work done then say eg. they forgot their wallet in the car and so on so on...then never come back to pay

Interestingly this is how some dentists dealt with it
The dentist numbed the patient up with LA and then asked the patient to go get money before any treatment was carried out. If they run away, u only lose one LA. Save urself some trouble.

Imagine me saying this to patients...

"......Mr. X I'll make u a deal. I'll give u LA for FREE and let u go back to grab ur wallet. This LA is like a 2hrs tram ticket so please come back to see me before it expires......"

Fare evasion is the same, be it Tram or dental work, except while u may get away with not having tram ticket, dental consequence is instant and guaranteed at the moment LA wears off.

The Choice

The other day I had a thought and realised that I'm close to being in clinics for 2 yrs already, given that the current 2nd are going into clinics now.
In my experience, I has gone through a fair share of decent and difficult pt.
Today I treated my first primary care pt and I really felt rewarded to give someone emergency pain relief. On top of that, it was the most decent cavity prep I did all semester.
In the afternoon though, was... somewhat a contrast to a perfect morning
Have u ever called anyone and got yelled at non-stop for 10 mins? How about that...twice?
That was my pt and today I thought I have had enough
so I gave my pt a good chat

"......I would like to talk to u for the next 5 mins and I want u to listen to me without interrupting. Is that ok with u?

I feel that you are unhappy with what I’m doing and you feel that I’m wasting your time.
Maybe because it takes longer in a public hospital or you have been frustrated with your previous dental experience elsewhere

But this is what I do. I look in your mouth. I found out what is the problem and I’m trying to fix it. You have what is called a chronic periodontitis. The accumulated harden plaque over many years caused the gum to inflame and the gum pocket depth to increase. This is where the bleeding comes from. Like I said to you before, the tooth doesn’t bleed. The gum bleeds.

What I did was going around the tooth and cleaned it all up. The demonstrator made an extra effort to make sure I did a thorough job during the last appointment.

I had the instrument in your mouth for over an hour last time. You, out of all the people should have realised I was cleaning the tooth you asked me to.

We did warn you that the tooth may not recover because it has been left in a bad condition for many years. You think that you have a strong tooth. To a certain extent I do agree that you have been able to keep it up until now but it is not healthy.
The gum pocket in a healthy mouth is 1-2mm. Yours is 20+mm. There is almost no bone support left on the tooth. I want your wife to have a look that I’m not lying to you.
Sometimes the treatment doesn’t work out the way you wanted. I’m a dentist, not a miracle worker.

Now I know that you are obviously unhappy and that makes me unhappy having to listen to you. I can assure you that I did my best but you felt that my best isn’t good enough for you. So I don’t think I would be able to help you any further. Now it’s time for you to decide.
I have 2 options for you
1) You continue with the treatment I’m proposing or
2) I can refer you to a 5th yr student or a specialist (with small amount of fee). I can tell you now that they both would be picking up the same scaler and do exactly the same thing as I did but maybe they can do a better job

If you want me to refer, your name will be put on the waiting list but if you want to continue with my treatment, you have to accept that the treatment may not goes as how you would like it to be......."

OMG

OMG OMG OMG !!!!!!

Today marked the first day the do-it-in-ur-time 60 MCQ test becomes available online
60 MCQ on oral medicine to be done in 60 mins
It'll be online for a week but we only get one chance to do it
I couldnt believed I got sucked in by Prof McCullough
He said "Do it here (com lab) today at 5 pm and get it out of the way. Plus u avoid having ur com froze up at midnight sometimes next sunday or have problem with slow internet connection speed"

OMG OMG
At 5pm I started the test...2 mins later, the com lab guy came to kick me out
I was on question 4...arghhhhhhh
How could I forget that the lab closes at 5pm everyday???
and what troubled me more than my maximum-score-of-10 test result (ya, I randomly clicked the next 6 questions) was Prof McCullough
Did he just plainly forget like I did? or was he saying it as a joke and I was the only one who didnt get it?

OMG OMG OMG
hopefully he'll reset the test for me...dun wanna fail 4th yr just yet

Sunday

This morning I woke up at 8am for the first time on sunday, hoping to make up for the lack of day time yesterday when I woke up at 5pm.
I had a plan to go for a grand food shopping since the supply in the house was totally exhausted.
8am was cold. It just finished raining and the forecast said there will be a few showers today.
I hate rain when I'm cycling.
The sky was cloudy and I longed for some Vitamin D.
The thought of warmth underneath my doona felt strangely comforting given I had just a bit less than 4 hrs of sleep
But I promised to get out and do some shopping today
So I made a deal that if it doesnt rain again by the time I finished my bacon and egg + shower then I'll go out.
It didnt...
As I cycled out, the sky cleared. The road was empty and the morning air was very refreshing.
For the first time, I got to vic market at the opening time rather than the closing time
I got the first pick of all the meat and vegetable rather than the left over/half price stuffs (not that I know how to pick the good slice of meat)
Met a fren and went to buy stuffs at Laguna in QV and also dropped by at Mindgames
Frens wanted lunch at Hungry Jacks but I didnt get anything
Played badminton for a couple of games
All in all... a good day

Things I learnt
- A particular fren of mine is also into boardgames
- "There are things in life which seemed like a good idea at times but u regret doing it afterwards" eg. eating burgers
- If u dun give something a chance, u may regret not knowing what it wouldve been like
(referring to me getting outside today)

PS. dun u find the last 2 points contradicting?

Premier League Drama

As per usual on a sunday night trying to cram some work b4 the next week starts, I proscrastinated.
Browsing through soccernet.com has never intrigued me as much as it did tonight for I witnessed an incredible english soccer drama in front of computer screen on what its called a Premier League D-Day...no visual...no sound...just some random narrator's frequent comments (which I found funny at times)

While there was a prestigious battle of Man U and Chelsea fighting for the crown; Fulham, Reading and Birmingham were going all out to stay in the league next season

Man U was sitting on 84 pt, equaled to Chelsea. They needed a win to secure the cup or anything that basically matches Chelsea, a draw for a draw or a lost for a lost but u know how Chelsea stat goes at Stamford Bridge.

Fulham, Reading and Birmingham were on 33, 33, 32 pt respectively with Fulham a few goal diff ahead of Reading

I started following the log at half time. To my comfort, Man U was leading 1-0 from Ronaldo's penalty and John Terry got injured which is a ++ for Champions League
but hey... things didnt look too good at times...Scholes with near chance of getting sent off and more shots firing at United's net in first half and u know how Man U normally reacts to that...Rio do stupid moves, Brown gives away penalty, Vidic forgets to mark someone...something of that sort (Evra is alright...hes cool)

Second half went better for Man U, increasing their ball possession to 66% and fired crap load of shots in the middle of the game.
Wigan's boys picked up more yellow cards and Fergie secured 11 players by subbing Schole off for Hargreaves which was relieving.
Giggs also came on for his record 758 appearances for Man U (equals to #1 Sir Bobby Charlton)

62 mins...Shevchenko scored... what a pest...I hate Ballack and Shevchenko so much. They just keep coming back to haunt Man U lately
See things can go either way now

On the sideline, Man city match kept feeding comments through...goal...goal...goal...goal......goal again.
Man City just got totally pawned. The commentator said "byebye Eriksson"
I realised later that they were running on 10 players. Poor them but they did managed to score 1 around finishing time to the commentator's "only 6 more". They finished 1-8

In the mean time, Giggs scored in his milestone match to secure the win and the cup... byebye Chelsea
I clicked to the main page. The headline was Shevchenko scoring and making a winning face...poor him didnt know what was coming.
To add to the victory, Chelsea score got levelled (GG) by Bolton in injury time...
Chelsea and Premier league cup...just wasnt meant to be

On the other side of the ladder, Reading and Birmingham blasted their opponents 3 or 4 goals each but it was all useless when Fulham scored a late goal to win 1-0 and stayed out of the bottom 3 on goal difference too

Liverpool and Arsenal won...insignificant

Moral of the story: Good guys win. Champions win more

Softie or Cold hearted

When seeing me in the clinics, a lot of my frens think that I'm confident (at times) or overly stressed (at times)
For the most parts, I'm not really as stressed as ppl made it out to be.
Apart from the fact that clinics IS a more stressful environment (for us students who dun know what we're doing), that's just how I am when I dun smile.
Do u realise that when I'm not smiling I have a naturally sad/stressful/life-is-shit face ?(which I can also explain in terms of occlusion but I won't bore u with it) and its pretty damn hard to smile 24 hrs a day...so u get a lot of the non-smiling bits from me
In the clinics, I talk less, being more careful of what I'm saying in front of/behind pt and all
Wearing the mask didn't help. While my mouth was screaming "shittttt...pulpal exposure" silently, my eyes didnt give away much. All pt got was a blank look from me
I think it's part of the professionalism that has been taught/expected of us to behave in such a way
Interestingly I find that when seeing pt, students who put on a serious look may be viewed by patients as being more competent.
By that I mean. When we are being professional... not getting emotionally involved.... calm... we tend to talk less and just do our work. pt see that as a sign of confidence (being in control) and do respect us for it

but then again, lecturers do ram the concept of "communications" and "building up rapport" into our heads week in week out
Looking at my frens who talk a lot, pt do feel more comfortable around them but I feel that pt dun take those students as seriously and treat them more like kids.

Is pt's confidence in our skills or rapport more important?
Should I put on the face or talk more?

Back to the basics

While we are learning and achieving many complex things, we are forgetting the basics (or the common sense stuffs) which at the end of the day, come back and bite us in the back

-Learnt to do PFM crown prep, Gold crown prep, All ceramic crown prep, Veneer, Onlays and so on so on, yet still forgetting to turn on the suction everytime and wet my gown

-Learnt to master wax work and making dentures but kept losing the teeth
I lost a premolar yesterday. Today I lost a molar and found the lost premolar which I 've already replaced from yesterday. Always keep small things where u wouldn't lose it....stick it to the wax or something

-Learnt to treat patients but dun write up records properly...useless

We knew all about it yet we overlooked it and dismissed it as something unimportant. Mistakes are mistakes, be it simple or complex

On a random note:
My palm cramped after scaling yesterday...kept rubbing it
Today my calf cramped while sleeping... reminded me how painful a cramp is...wanted to bite my own finger
and I was just learning about acute pain in the lecture today...typical response