At the start of this week one of my first jobs (after the Monday meeting) was to provide a sinus grafting procedure and simultaneous implant placement (sorry if you’re not dental) which was to be videoed and photographed to collect material for the Geistlich worldwide online academy.
In the middle of last year, we were asked if we wanted to be involved in the development of Geistlich’s online academy and we therefore developed a module (myself, Beatriz and Kath) to teach the basics of sinus grafting procedures to dentists interested in that subject and for it to be broadcasted on their worldwide online platform.
In November I travelled to Switzerland and filmed surgery on a model which would be used as part of a practical teaching session and the third part of that was to film a live case and we’d identified a patient to carry that out on this week.
The problem is that the core aspect of my work is to look after patients.
The ‘why’ of my business dictates that, that is my job and the person in front of me, undergoing treatment, is the most important thing.
To provide a teaching resource which could (probably only in theory) help a thousand dentists be a little bit better could in turn affect tens of thousands of patients positively but as I sat in front of our patient on Monday morning they began to hyperventilate before the procedure had begun.
And so, there is a human being in front of me hyperventilating and worried about the surgery procedure, but I have a video to collect.
It’s my job to produce a world-class video (I don’t think that’s ever likely) showcasing world-class surgery to thousands of dentists and the subject in front of me is too nervous.
That’s a crossroads isn’t it?
I turned left into patient management and had a long chat with the patient about cancelling the procedure and coming back another day and maybe being sedated or maybe being better informed or maybe overcoming their fears.
In the end they felt that they could proceed, and they did and all I concentrated on was looking after them to the best of my ability while other people snapped and filmed etc.
As soon as I’d finished Beatriz came in (she’d been in charge of collecting the video from upstairs) and was delighted with the way it had gone and what it had looked like, but I wasn’t.
I’ve never done a procedure which I would ever consider to be world-class in my life and that was certainly not one either.
I could picture people watching it and criticizing the position of the implant or the way I did this or that or how it was closed or any other number of things but what I had done was provide the procedure to a pretty high standard for someone who was nervous, who was now relaxed and delighted to be completed.
I’m never going to be ‘world famous’ in dentistry.
I’m never going to be Danny Buser or Rony Jung or Frank Schwarz or any number of those guys who travel the world on a week-by-week basis showcasing their work and inspiring people.
But the person who left the surgery with a personal story from during treatment, who now has the thing that they wanted to have which for them improves their life, that’s the highlight.
That’s the headline.
Maybe we picked the wrong patient, maybe we didn’t but there will be other surgeries to film and other photographs to collect.
I’m not in a hurry.
Blog Post Number - 3003
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