Blog

Explain the historical context of this political cartoon. In other words, what is the cartoon trying to say?  

CASE STUDY #1: Your patient presents for a periodontal maintenance appointment after being gone for 10 months due to the pandemic.  She is usually on a 4 month recall, so this is an amount of time that would usually have included two appointments.   She reports hypertension and diabetes, both of which she controls with medications, and her vitals today are BP 130/86, pulse 88, respirations 14. In doing your periodontal assessments and radiographs, you determine that she has 4mm probe depths in the anterior teeth, several 5-6mm probe depths in the posterior teeth with isolated furcation involvement and generalized moderate to heavy calculus.  She has several amalgam restorations and crowns and you notice several areas of demineralization and recurrent decay, but she is not having any pain or sensitivity.  Use this information to answer the following questions. QUESTION: Your instructor advises that you may need a higher amount of power to remove the calculus.  Which inserts cannot tolerate greater than low to medium power?

You are scheduled to complete a periodontal maintenance on your patient.  They last had complete periodontal charting and head and neck exam at their last appointment 4 months ago.  When assessing your patient with a head and neck exam, you determine that they have a lesion on their lip from an accidental bite and that there are two large nevi on their face that were not noted before. While doing your periodontal assessments you determine that there are scattered 4-6mm probe depths, isolated areas of mobility and both generalized recession and furcation involvement. QUESTION: How should your probe be angled to access the probe depths in the proximals of the molars?

CASE STUDY #3: Your patient is an international graduate student who is new to the United States and has never had an appointment with a dental hygienist before. They have never experienced the ultrasonic power scaler and are curious about how it works and what it is used for.  They are studying physics and are interested in the technology. Based on the amount of moderate to heavy calculus you choose to start with a standard tip, then follow up with the ultraslim thinsert. The patient asks questions about tip choice, why water is used, is this instrument more effective than hand instruments, among others. Use this information to answer questions for this patient. QUESTION: Which of the following is not an accurate response about the use of water?  

You are preparing to complete scaling and root planing on the patient’s right side.  There are pockets on nearly every tooth, 4-5mm in the anterior and 4-7mm in the posteriors and nearly every tooth has 2-3mm of recession There is generalized moderate to heavy calculus both supra and subgingival, included radiographic, but the gingival tissue is generally tight and resilient. You need to determine what instruments you are using, what power setting and inserts will be necessary with your ultrasonic and how to determine if your hand instruments are well suited for treating a difficult periodontally involved patient. QUESTION: Which inaccurately describes the use of the periodontal explorer to check the progress of calculus removal? 

You and your classmates are participating with a dental screening event at a local health fair for immigrant and refugee families that have recently relocated to central Ohio. As part of this screening, you are using your magnification loupes and headlight, and have access to shepherd hooks explorers, periodontal explorers, probes and mirrors. On any willing participate, you are completing a head and neck oral cancer screening, an abbreviated PSR screening using one tooth in each sextant, and identifying any clinical visible areas that you are suspicious of decay. You chart all of this information and present a summary form and referral to the OSU dental clinic for each of the participants.   QUESTION: You detect several areas of decay on the posterior proximal surfaces of the participants such as in this photo.  What classification of decay would this be?

CASE #1: You are seeing a 34 year old patient who recently moved to the United States and has never had a dental hygiene visit before. As you are completing your assessments, you determine that the patient is periodontally involved with probe depths over 3-6mm with calculus on 50% of the surfaces of their teeth. You take a full series of radiographs and determine that they have radiographic ledges and spicules of calculus and slight bone loss. Use this information to answer the following questions: QUESTION: What will you feel with the explorer when you have completely removed the calculus on a tooth surface?

Your new  patient is a mechanical engineer who has been away from the dentist for a few years.  He had been going to an older dentist who retired and hadn’t been up on newer technology in the dental office.  His very interested in learning about what and how you are doing  the procedures of the appointment and asks a lot of good questions.  Choose the right answer to each of his questions.   QUESTION: At what angulation do you hold your power and hand instruments to get the calculus and stain off?

If my computer has a problem, can I turn in late quizzes, homework, and discussion posts?

Your new  patient is a mechanical engineer who has been away from the dentist for a few years.  He had been going to an older dentist who retired and hadn’t been up on newer technology in the dental office.  His very interested in learning about what and how you are doing  the procedures of the appointment and asks a lot of good questions.  Choose the right answer to each of his questions. QUESTION: At what frequency does your ultrasonic instrument work (assuming you are using the Cavitron units at the Ohio State College of Dentistry)?