Frustrated with probing & exploring

Today we did more exploring and probing. I am wondering if I have enough patience to learn this. I am getting a little frustrated honestly but I just keep telling myself that if I stick with it, one day I really will be able to do it. There are so many things to think about when you are exploring and probing... your position, your posture, your grasp, your fulcrum, the amount of pressure to apply, keeping your grip loose, rolling... etc. I have a headache! But its not all bad, I mean, I think it will be fun to do when it doesn't take so dang long.

Scary little things

Today we worked on mannequins mouths... basically DXXTR without a face. Scary little things! We worked more on exploring and getting good fulcrums. I liked working on my lab partner better than working on the mannequin but it was good to work on the mannequin to be able to be a little more daring with my explorer and go more subginigivally. We got a little head start on probing too... boring! :)

Exploring - ouch!

In today's clinic we did the intra-oral exam for the first time. I thought the hardest part was just learning all the different anatomy we need to look over. After we finished that, we started practicing with our explorers. Thanks for letting me make you bleed Ashley! Exploring was pretty exciting because it was my first real experience working with an instrument. I am still having a hard time with posture and it was hard concentrating on not letting my wrists bend too much or getting my head bent at awkard angles. I am still kind of stunned that I am actually here, learning the art of hygiene!

Extra-oral cancer screening

Today in clinic I learned to do Extra-oral exam for cancer. It was fun and awesome when I got to be someone's patient because its a really nice little massage. I might have relaxed my patients a little too much because I had a hard time finding their blood pressure afterwards... or maybe that's just because I am slow and still can't take a BP! The rest of DH clinic was a little harder because I find the fulcrum and instrument positions to be really awkward and hard to do. Well, I salute Hygienist's for their skills because I honestly had no idea that so much skill was involved in cleaning teeth! As for Radiology, I consider my day a HUGE success because I completed two BWX on DXXTR #2 and he is a bugger with all of his overlapping teeth. Here we go!

Vital Signs

Today in clinic we assessed vital signs on 4 different patients. Everything went well but we got done really early so I am wondering if we could have done more activities during this clinic session. It was a fun clinic session though.

My boyfriend and me...