drilled the wrong tooth?

Dental treatment and pain are two things that can not be separated from one another. They always go hand in hand just like the other infamous couples such as power -corruption, politics-criminals and of course bomb blasts and terrorists. I have tried my best to convince people, through word and deed, that the first two entities need not always co exist, but have failed miserably.

One of my patients is a young man, well educated and well employed. His job takes him around the world and his teeth make him see dentists all over the world. He was born and brought up in Ponda and consequently majority of the art works in his mouth carry my signature. However, as a result of his globe trotting, and associated compulsions, art works of dentists from other parts of the world are also displayed. One such is an expensive filling done in London. He had paid a fabulous price and naturally expected fantastic results. But dentists are dentists, be it London or Ponda, and a blunder is never far away from a dentist. Some decay remained in the tooth, flourished with nourishment from all over the world, progressed into a robust infection and ended up in an abscess ( A pus filled cavity). After being away from home for months together, he was longing for his fish curry and rice, but leave alone chewing the food lovingly prepared by his mother, the fellow could not even dare closing the mouth. Just the contact of the infected tooth with it’s counterpart in the other jaw caused distress. So he presented himself at my door-mouth half open and hungry. He said he had not eaten anything for the past two days.

He pointed to the tooth and the small swelling on his jaw, and my diagnosis was made. To his luck, I even knew the treatment! The pus around the root of the infected tooth, deep inside his jaw had to be drained out and the best way to achieve it was to drill right through the tooth, up to the root and allow the pus to flow out through the drilled hole.
Unbelievable though it may seem, it is true that, this process which sounds like a fourth degree torture, is ABSOLUTELY PAINLESS – if it is done the way it should be. It is only the tooth with the nerves alive that succeeds in making it’s owner do somersaults in the confined space of a dental chair when a drill is applied. Once the nerves are dead and degenerated, the tooth does make the owner jump on application of pressure but if the tooth is drilled with out applying ANY pressure, there is absolutely no pain.

In any case, had I explained my course of action to him I was sure that,( with his experience in traveling around the world) he would only need a fraction of a second to locate the place farthest from my clinic and make arrangements to reach there at the earliest. He was my only patient for the day and my son had been pestering me to have his mobile recharged. Further delay in recharging the mobile would endanger his (my son’s) life as his SMS supply – more important than oxygen- would be cut off. I had to retain my patient and make him pay for the recharge. I decided to act.

I ordered the young man to the chair, started examining him, stretched my arm in stealth to get hold of the drill and applied it to his tooth. Even though his eyes widened, toes curled and body tensed on hearing the whine of the drill, he remained in the chair. I had treated him earlier and he was sure that I would not kill him in any case. It took me only a few minutes to drill through the tooth, most of which was rotten any way, and reach the root. I could see the pus trickling out through the hole, stopped my work, washed the tooth and placed a small pellet of cotton in the hole that I had drilled. He had not felt any pain all through the procedure.

When he was out of the chair, he was able to close the mouth and the tooth was not hurting as much as it was, earlier. He said that he was feeling much better and paid for my son’s mobile recharge with pleasure. He was about to leave, looking forward for a hearty meal, but before that he wanted to know what I did to his tooth. Now that I was home safely, I explained to him what I had done but he refused to believe me. He said “Doctor, do you say that you drilled through the tooth that was hurting so badly and I did not feel anything? Sure that I have some relief after your treatment and I am sorry to doubt your work. But I think that you have drilled a different tooth that was normal.”