Old Man Teeth

Finally, a dentist who does his job

When I lived in Icheon I never seems to be able to find a dentist. My conversations always seemed to go a little something like this:

Dentist: “What seems to be the problem?”
Me: “Nothing, I would just like a check up.”
Dentist: “Do you have any pain?”Me: “No.”
Dentist: “Then what would you like me to do?”
Me: “I would like you to do a check-up and see if anything it wrong, needs fixing.”
Dentist: “But where do you have pain?”
Me: “Nothing is wrong that I know if, you stupid f***. I want YOU to look and tell me if something is wrong, as if something that will, in a year from now, have me unable to eat and bound to lose a tooth.”
Dentist: “So, you have no pain?”

Sigh. Unfortunately I don’t have insurance back home so doing these check-ups and getting anything fixed would have cost me an arm and a leg.

Yesterday I went to a dentist that I read about in the local Facebook group. He speak very good English, so I was able to tell him what I needed and he was able to explain what was happening.

First up was a cleaning. New rules are that medical insurance covers one per year. Before doing the cleaning his hygienist took photos of my teeth. I don’t mean x-ray shots. I mean actual digital photos, with a small camera in my mouth. Interesting.

After the cleaning the dentist came over and used the images to explain to me what he thought needed to be done. My teeth are in terrible condition. Two of my molars have questionable structural integrity because of the large fillings and he thinks I might need to cap them in the near future. Apparently the current fillings are too big and if he removes that to refills and fix cavities at the edges, then they are in danger of cracking. Scary.

All in all I will have to get seven cavities fixed. Bloody hell! Grinding my teeth is taking its toll and I can’t get a new mouth guard until the fillings are done. About three visits for the fillings, three more for the guard and then it is maintenance like crazy. I don’t want old man teeth by the time I’m 60 years old.