Dental drama, cont.

I finally got to see the dentist yesterday, and he replaced the missing filling.

He took an X-ray of the tooth that hurts and couldn't really locate the cause. He said that in general my teeth were looking pretty bad and that I might one day consider getting dentures, although I am not there yet. He started to write a prescription for oxycodone, but since I already have one, I didn't take it.

The problem is, it's OK for me to take oxycodone at home, but I can't go out and about with it. He said to try a tiny tiny bit. I would rather be in pain than wrap my car around a tree.

I am glad that I have an appointment with the specialist, Dr. Nathaniel Treister, on Thursday. I am trying not to glom onto the denture thing because I have faith that he will figure it out. Still, I flashed to a memory of an elderly relative using his tongue to push his dentures in and out of his mouth.

To reassure myself, I reread Dr. Treister's profile:

Associate Surgeon, Brigham and Women's HospitalAssistant Professor of Oral Medicine, Infection, and Immunity, Harvard Medical School

And his research statement:

I am principal investigator on an investigator-initiated prospective clinical trial for management of oral chronic graft-versus-host disease, supported through the DFCI hematology/oncology division. I’ve conducted and have a number of ongoing retrospective studies looking at clinical characteristics, complications, management outcomes and cost analyses of patients with oral chronic graft-versus-host disease and other oral medicine conditions.