Dirty Dancing
by Alex McRae

I was born with bad teeth, and over the years that situation hasn't improved. The good news is, I've always been blessed with good dentists.

From the guy that filled my baby teeth to the dental school student who pulled my first two wisdom teeth to my present dentist, who has the patience of a saint, they've all been great.

But now I suspect their skill isn't totally the result of years of training. My dentists have something else in common that is just as important as skill with a drill. As far as I know, none of them could (or can) dance worth a flip.

Having a non-dancing dentist is important, especially if your dentist is prone to dancing while working in your mouth. This can get painful and expensive, as a Syracuse, N.Y., woman learned the hard way three years ago.

It was late 2004, a beautiful day in upstate New York. But Brandy Fanning didn't notice the autumn splendor. She was too concerned with a rowdy tooth. Fanning fought the pain as long as she could, but when the agony became unbearable, she went to the emergency dental clinic at the Syracuse Community Health Center.

That's where she met the dentist on duty, the not-so-aptly named Dr. George Trusty. The good doctor took a peek in Fanning's mouth and said the bad molar had to come out, pronto. Here's where things got scary.

Trusty filled Fanning with Novocaine, then got busy. He said later he decided to break the molar into four pieces to make it easier to yank. So far, so good. But while Trusty was drilling her tooth into chunks, Fanning heard a loud snapping noise that alarmed her.

The next noise she noticed was the song, "Car Wash," playing on the officemusic system.

Fanning didn't mind the song. What bothered her was the fact that, as he was drilling away, Dr. Trusty was dancing along with the music, performing a series of rhythmical steps reminiscent of the Temptations or Four Tops.

Although such moves are widely admired by musical audiences, they are not generally associated with general dentistry. And apparently the steps were a hindrance to Dr. Trusty's work, which explains the loud "snap!" Fanning heard, which was the sound of Dr. Trusty's drill breaking clean off and sailing into Fanning's nasal sinus cavity.

Trusty tried to retrieve the wayward drill bit with a metal hook. He only succeeded in driving it farther through Fanning's nasal cavity and into the bone. When Fanning realized things had gone terribly wrong, she asked Trusty for an explanation.

He told Fanning having a dental drill stuck in your sinuses was no big deal, and said she'd probably sneeze it out in a day or two.

Luckily, Fanning wasn't impressed by either Trusty's dentistry or fancy footwork. She said she wanted a second opinion, and Trusty called an oral surgeon on the spot. When Trusty hung up, he told Fanning she needed to get to an emergency room ASAP.

He then gave her an extra shot of Novocaine in case there was a long wait.

Surgical x-rays revealed what the attending doctor's notes described as "...a 2.5 cm linear metallic object in the left maxillary sinus." An oral surgeon managed to remove the drill bit by boring a hole in Fanning's upper gum.

As for sneezing the bit out, the doctor later told Fanning that a sneeze might have blinded her.

As you can imagine, things did not go well from there, and faster than you can scream "Lawsuit!" the attorneys were on the scene. The case has finally gone to court. Fanning will no doubt be compensated hugely for Dr. Trusty's dancing dental efforts.

Let's hope it works out for all parties involved, but if you're thinking about changing dentists, you might want to forget the fancy diplomas and letters of recommendation.

Instead, you might start by taking your prospective dentist out dancing. If he's got some good moves on the floor, you may not want him near your mouth.