The principles of his practice are simple: dentistry should do no harm, and as dental health practitioners we must look at the mouth, teeth, gums and jaws as integral parts of a larger, whole body system. The health and structural integrity of the mouth both influence and are influenced by everything else going on in the body from skeletal mechanics to nutritional biochemistry.
There was a time not too long ago, when certain dental organizations frowned upon dentists who blurred the line between medicine and dentistry but now integration is being encouraged.
There was a time not long ago, when the earth was the center of the universe, and obviously flat. Then ridiculed thinkers against oppression suggested that maybe the earth was round, and they were imprisoned for suggesting that it circled the sun. Every time we think we have figured it out, we realize we have only have figured out a small piece of the whole.
In the year 1990, he started his first year of dental school. He truly loved all aspects of his dental education particularly the clinical/laboratory part. Dr. Panahpour was one of the few students in the history of his school to receive a triple “AAA” grade upon the final presentation of his clinical laboratory projects.
It was during his second year of dental school, that he started seeing patients. Due to his expertise, he was handed about 300 patient charts for which he was responsible to review and direct care.
It was then that I saw the “ugly” cycle of it all.
The process of journey starts with a little filling; the little filing becomes a bigger filling, and then a crown or even a root canal/crown. Then the tooth is extracted and you get a bridge and then possibly a denture of some sort. Still, ironically, Dr. Panahpour had a few patients who never brushed, flossed, but still did not have a single cavity all of their life!
What does that tell us?
The icing on the cake was when he was introduced to a few researchers who shared their work with me, before publishing it, on training monkeys to do dentistry! He figured if chimps could be trained to go to the moon, than dentistry is not far behind.
It was during these early years of his career in dentistry, when he knew that he wanted more out of this field than the same-old, same-old. His love for this field goes above and beyond the rewards, but it has been the only thing that has saved me when he was so challenged.