What I want to know is, why doesn't someone with a clue design dental tools?
Forget the drill. No, it's not nice, but I'm generally numb when it is used, and its use is irregular at best.
No, the real problems are the tools I see every four months:
- the sonic cleaner
- the polisher
- the spit sucker
There is a special place in hell reserved for the person who invented the sonic tooth cleaner, and I don't even remotely believe in hell. This thing causes pain at a level that is hard to imagine. Supposedly this is because I have exposed roots, but in reality all a hygienist has to do is leave this thing in a single place for more than a fraction of a second and I am writhing, even where my teeth are in excellent condition. It's a deep ache that spreads out from the point of contact on the tooth. If left in one place for more than about 5 seconds I am convinced I would black out. I'd probably confess to anything the Bush administration wanted me to confess to as well, but then I'd lose consciousness.
The polisher seems benign enough, I know, and most of you probably think it's harmless. However, if you visited my dentist you might discover your mistake. The polisher I am subjected to is air driven, and it exhausts the air right into my mouth, right onto my teeth. If I had perfectly normal teeth this might not be a problem, but I don't. Instead I have teeth that lack enamel on various surfaces, and cold air blowing out of the polisher actually hurts. Once again I think some tool designer needs to spend eternity in pain as a result of this bit of work. It would have been pretty simple to capture the exhaust air and route it somewhere else. Even just a foot or two back down along the incoming air line would have kept it out of my mouth and from causing pain, but no. If you designed a polisher that exhausts into my mouth, and we meet, and I figure out what you did, you may be missing some of your own teeth before our conversation is entirely complete.
And finally the spit sucker. This has the low tech version of the polisher problem. It draws air across my teeth in ways that I do not approve of or appreciate. This one I do my best to control during my visit, but today I found myself being pinned down by my hygienist as she polished my teeth and used the spit sucker at the same time. So I had two sources of drafty nastiness in my mouth. I was not a happy camper. Not at all.
When a dog needs to have its teeth cleaned they knock it out entirely. I am starting to think that maybe I should go to the vet to get my teeth cleaned simply to get knocked out first.
And if you're a budding young dental tool designer, please keep in mind that avoiding pain is a good idea. Find a way to make your tools pain free and I will be in your debt. But if you continue on in the grand tradition of existing dental tool designers, i will be your implacable foe for the rest of my life.
