Every dentist goes back and forth from one century to another a few times a day.

In one room we are forced to extract a tooth, in a method straight out of the 18th century. The technologies we use, and the techniques we use have not changed since the civil war, or the revolutionary war.

And in the room next door we do procedures like laser fillings, computer designed crowns that did not exist in the latest years of the 20th century.

In many cases we have to make this century leap on the same patient at the same appointment. It is something we take for granted, but it is a maddening experience sometimes.

We go to great lengths to be judged by our patients as being state of the art. But sometimes events occur brought upon usually by the patient’s neglect, which force us to be judged by standards that defy modernity. Teeth still don’t come with handles to help us get them out.

“How long can I let my house remain on fire before I must call the fire department” is still the means by which vast hordes of people use to determine when it is time to go to the dentist.

No matter how much we try to keep abreast of the latest in pain controlling technologies, we are still often forced by the patient’s dental neglect to be the best “saw-bones-amputationist” which the civil war could train.

This not the fault of the dentist.