Communication

It has been my observation over the last decade that many of the dentists that we work with do not play well with others. There is definitely a communication and sharing problem.

We write letters for everything, and I mean everything, that needs to be done in another office. We also write letters with concerns that we may have such as a suspicion of a cavity in a patient's mouth. I have to give a shout out to oral surgeons here because they seem to be very good at sharing. They send reports all the time. Dentists? Not so much.

There have been so many instances where a parent has reported something from the dentist and naturally, we know nothing about it and stand there with dumb looks on our faces. The doctor in my office is like, "Where's the report?" "Can they not send a report?" "What's the deal?" to which I reply, "You better fire up the crystal ball because it looks like you are gonna need it."  But of course, the crystal ball won't work and the mind reading cap is usually on the fritz too so I have to call the dentist's office to find out what is going on. Usually, they aren't open so I have to leave a voice mail and hope they call back today. Mind you, still no idea what is going on. So we wait and look stupid. Love when that happens.

All this can be solved by communication. Any communication. I hate paper. I would be happy to never again use paper. Save the trees and all that. But if you can't send a letter with your concerns then send an email, call and leave a message. These are all acceptable forms of communication. Just please keep us in the loop. Our mutual patients are just that...mutual. We share them. We need to know what everyone is doing in that kid's mouth to get the job done.

Another thing--this often happens when the dentist has an opinion about our treatment plan. They tell the parents their opinion and leave it to the parent to tell us. That's cheesy. If you have a concern then call, email or write and tell us. It is monumentally unfair to undermine our expertise to a parent. Share your concern and we can solve it together. Because I have mentioned before here that patients tend to really trust their dentists (which is great) but that trust should not interfere with our treatment plan.

We all have the best interests of our patients in mind. We should all work as a team to keep our patients' smiles beautiful and healthy!