Dental Emergency!

I'm not a fan of going to the dentist........I don't think there are many who are, except maybe those who work at them, or are the actual dentist!

Who else is not a fan of them is my youngest.

As you would imagine, we have a regular dentist back in Aberdeen, but that's not much use to us over here in Qatar. We had an appointment booked with them for next time we pay the city a visit, but unfortunately nature got the better of the bairn this time.

One night she complained of a sore tooth and taking a look inside her mouth could see that part of her tooth was missing. A large part of it. We had known of an underlying problem of 'Soft Teeth' and we were just trying to get through to her adult teeth coming in and hoping we would not need anything doing before then.

On a previous visit to the Aberdeen dentist, we had sealant applied with the aim of adding some further protection and longevity, but didn't quite make it through to her adult teeth.

She recognised that we needed to do something and agreed that we must get it at least looked at. We spoke to a couple of friends who had recommended a dentist in Doha, and given it was was early evening, decided we would take her in the morning after dropping her sister at school on the off chance someone could take a look or at least get an appointment booked soonest.

We couldn't get parked nearby and ended up walking from City Centre mall to the dentist, which felt like miles in the high 30C's.

The dentist was located on the 10th floor of Salem Tower, and the views out over West Bay were amazing.

Salam Tower

Walking into the reception of The British International Dental Centre, we were welcomed with very friendly staff. We explained the situation, and were told one of the dentists would be able to take a look in 30 minutes. We took a seat in the waiting room, completed the registration details for the patient and admired the views out over the bay.

We were called through to the dentist room and after massive amounts of persuasion and tears, managed to get the bairn to open her mouth and let the dentist have a look. The dentist was very patient, calm and friendly. After taking an x-ray and identify that an extraction may be the best option, we were given a prescription for some antibiotics and then made a provisional appointment for a few days time.

We collected the prescription from the pharmacy in the City Centre mall which was easy enough......unfortunately getting her to take them was a different matter, which I won't go into!

We received a message saying that a slot was available with the Pediatric Dentist in a couple of days so we readied for battle. Picking her up from school early and handing her a toothbrush to give her gnashers a clean, she instantly knew where we were going and wouldn't talk to us.

Traffic wasn't too bad, so we went into the Costa on the Corniche, think it would ease the tension and help relax her some, before walking across the road to the dentist, even managed to get some happy photos!

Arriving at the dentist, we check-in and proceeded to the waiting room. I was now starting to get worried at how this might end.....how much patience would the dentist have, what if they wanted to drill and repair rather than extract etc. Arghh!

We were called through, and learning from experience, it is better than mum is not there. So I took her in and to be honest she was amazing! The dentist was brilliant at keeping her relaxed and explained everything. Having the TV on the roof with Tom and Jerry playing also was a big win.

After he managed to get her to open and let him have a look, he agreed that extraction was the best choice. After spending some time explaining to her the process, he waited until she said she was ready to do this.

This was to be done under local, and the way he dealt with explaining the numbing and hiding the needle was brilliant. Applying the surface anesthetic, and then waiting for that to kick in before heading in with the big guns.

The smallest of tears only really started when the dentist managed to smuggle the pliers into her mouth and start to pull firmly, but stopping and keeping her calm before continuing worked wonders. Committed now, so in he went and out it came!

All done, we headed out and taking the dentist advice headed for the ice-cream shop in the Mall. The strange thing was all she wanted was hugs from daddy, mummy was the bad person for some reason! The strange mind of kids.....

Next was just priceless. with her numb mouth, she wasn't making any sense when trying to talk and ice cream was just drooling everywhere. Think she found this the most upsetting part!

The only other thing that she commented on (kept mentioning it) and was really angry about was the fact that the dentist did not tell her about the 'tweezers' as she called them, but she didn't accept that he didn't want to scare her...

It was one of those times when I wish I had recorded her trying to speak. I was trying to hold back the laughter which just made her even more frustrated. Her sister did an excellent job of translating however! 

So well done to Dr. Nafeh Nabil Fansa, for the way he dealt with her and to the wee soldier for going through what she did!

Back in a month for a follow up x-ray just to check the spacing for her adult tooth, which isn't far away going by the original x-ray.

Glad that was over!