Caleb's official 1st visit to dentist
Caleb's official 1st visit to dentist!
Although this photo is quite blur (taken using a handphone cam), it's a wonderful photo to me. It's Caleb lying on me, I'm lying on the dentist chair. Dr Bruce Lee is checking/counting on Caleb's teeth. The wonderful part is that Caleb opened his golden mouth, and allowed dentist to check his teeth without any struggle.
Visit to Dentist
I noticed that Caleb's 2 front teeth seemed to be very dirty, like there's some food stain, and no matter how I brushed, the stain didn't come off. We ever brought Caleb to a dental clinic, while Poon and I had our routine dental check, and wanted dentist to take a look at Caleb's teeth. Caleb had a tiny chip off of his front tooth. Dentist (at that was Dr Alan Yeong, already migrated) attempted to see his teeth, he refused to open, so we didn't insisted. This time, I was so worried that his 2 front teeth is decaying, so I booked appt for 2 adults and 1 toddler.
Preparation
I told Caleb 2 days before the appt date, that we will seeing Uncle Dentist. Uncle Dentist will count how many "choo choo" teeth Caleb had in his mouth. I told Caleb that he had to open his mouth big big, so that Uncle Dentist can count his teeth. Caleb was pretty excited, kept on agreeing and nodded his head, and say "Uncle Dentist", "count choo choo kai kai teeth",etc
The Dental Vist
Last night, we were the 1st to be on the evening consultation time, so we didn't have to wait. The new dentist is Dr Bruce Lee, he is also very professional, had his way with little toddler too. He started to build rapport with Caleb from the moment we went into his room. He said Hi to Caleb, asked him to give Hi-5. Caleb was willing do so. Dr Lee planned to see Poon 1st, so that Caleb roughly can see how it's done. When Poon sat on the dentist chair, Dr Lee asked Caleb to help him to count to 3, then the chair will do down. Caleb counted, and chair "automatically" went down. Caleb was so pleased, kept on saying "Daddy turn now, Kai kai wait. Caleb saw Poon wore the sunglasses. The dentist captured Poon's tooth on a TV, and explained his teeth, then he also told Caleb to take a look at daddy's teeth. Dr gave Caleb enough attention to make him feel confident of him.
Caleb's Turn
After Poon's turn, it's Caleb's. He sat on my lap all these while. So Dr Lee just asked both of us to be on the dentist chair. He showed Caleb how he put on his gloves, etc, just to make Caleb feel that visiting dentist is so fun. He asked Caleb to open mouth, it was a bit dark, so the overhead light had to be shined onto Caleb's mouth. The assistant offered Caleb the sunglasses, and Caleb was so willingly to put it on! That's how we got to take this photo. Dr Lee counted his teeth. For the record, Caleb has 8 top teeth,and 8 bottom (plus one that is rapturing of his gums) teeth.
Dr. Lee assessment of Caleb's teeth
Caleb's 2 front teeth is indeed decaying. Both definitely need to do filling. Permanent front teeth will only shot out when child is about 5-6 years old, so it's best to perserve the 2 teeth as long as possible. Based on Caleb's age, Dr. Lee felt it'll very tough to do it on Caleb's 1st visit, and Caleb's condition was not serious. He advised us to brush his teeth using a flourided toothpaste to delay the decaying process. He would see Caleb in 3 months time to monitor the condition. He hoped to do the filling in about 6 months time, when he's about 3 years old, hoping he will more co-operative, and for these few months, Dr. Lee also hoped to make Caleb fully confident and comfortable with him. He would prefer to do the filling the natural way like how we adult get our fillings done. If that is not possible, then he would gave Caleb some oral stuff, that would made Caleb drowsy so that he would not struggle while Dr. Lee do the fillings. The last option is to do GA but Dr. Lee felt that the option is over-doing. We also would want to put Caleb under GA.
Currently, we could only do our part, diligently brush Caleb's teeth twice a day. I felt so guilty for not being insistent(using the force method) on brushing Caleb's teeth when his teeth were out. It took us several months before Caleb is more willingly to let us brush his teeth. We still need to "force" our way to brush his teeth at times, but it's much easier nowadays. We could only pray that the decay will be prolonged until Caleb had his fillings done.
Edited at 4.30pm : I just checked with Tinatimroy whom she had seen before, a very nice dentist at Paragon who everyone seemed to know except me, so I checked with Tina, and confirmed that Dr Bruce Lee is the same dentist that Tina is seeing at Paragon. Jin jinsiew, you can rest assured, and book appt and request to see this Dr Bruce Lee at the DentalCare@Fajar. He's a very nice dentist, just like Dr Alan Yeong.