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The slow decay of dentistry


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12 hours ago, member_225 said:

In the long run I think it's worth it too, I'm just saying if we're talking short term (up until mid thirties) you won't exactly be making bank. Especially with a 300k-400k loan, you'd basically be making minimum wage for a number of years, something you could have started doing at 16 yrs old. Just something to consider. As for buying the dental practise, I actually talked to my dentist about this when I thought of pursuing dentistry. You'd be an idiot not to take a few years to associate and build speed/skill under another dentist's supervision. If not, it's lawsuits waiting to happen, not just from your patients, but staff as well LOL

the same can be said about opening a new practice.  you're not guaranteed any income for quite some time.  With that thought process, you're better off working at mcdonalds with your DDS/DMD - but you're not going to do that because you're betting off trying to build up your patient base and hope in the long run that your earning potential will be 10X more or higher.  Doing dentistry isn't a short term investment.

Edit: nothing wrong with working at mcdonald's. After dealing with difficult patients, I sometimes wish I was working in fastfood again.

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8 minutes ago, member_225 said:

Long term dentistry is better. But also the McDonald’s worker can work his way up to managerial positions after many years of knowing the ins and outs and possibly earn more. In and out managers earn 160k on average. 

When the dentist retires and sells off the practice(s), they do get a hefty paycheque! But anyways, this is why I hope people understand dentistry is not the only career making $$$. Yes dentistry has a higher ceiling for pay but on average, if your chasing 6 figures there are tons of other careers in healthcare, as well as finance/business that can get you there. 

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1 hour ago, member_225 said:

Long term dentistry is better. But also the McDonald’s worker can work his way up to managerial positions after many years of knowing the ins and outs and possibly earn more. In and out managers earn 160k on average. 

Perfect examples of other ways of making over 6 figures. 

 

My parents didn't even finish high school or have a proficient grasp of the English language but managed to make over 6 figures a year running their own restaurant.  But that involved long working 16 hour days, everyday of the week.  This was the late 90s to mid 2000s.  Good money, really shit lifestyle.

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I find it LAUGHABLE that all of you are going into this field for the MONEY. I, for one, am choosing to go into this career to ENJOY the unique and uncomparable experiences of the field of dentistry. I CAN'T WAIT until I get the opportunity to develop carpal tunnel, chronic back-pain, arthritis, crippling depression, and overwhelming debt. How can a 9-5 office job at an accounting firm POSSIBLY compare to the daily spectacles of vomit comets splattering on to my brand new $9.99 plaid Joe Fresh button up or the humbling feat of crying myself to sleep everynight with the haunting words of cute little 5 year old Sally from church echoing through my mind as she tells me "Dentists are all med rejects." Can't ask for a better way to spend the next 40 years of my life.

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Honestly I've only been practicing about 2.5 years and I already feel like I've aged at least twice that. Some mild eye, neck & joint issues creeping in that I have to nip in the bud before they get worse.

That along with the long hours & commutes and trust me, if someone offered me a less physically taxing way of making a 6-figure income, I would happily take it. 

I certainly don't plan on doing this forever. Once again it's only one part of my life and I have to find aspects of it that I enjoy and love and hold onto those things, but I am actively making sure it is not the primary part of my life because I think I'd shoot myself from the exhaustion & stress. People doing this for the money thinking it's an easy paycheque (or even a stable one) are going to be sorely disappointed. And people investing half a million dollars before even seeing a dime of it? That is the most mind-boggling part to me. Because even if you had ZERO debt from school itself, dentistry is still a massive delay-of-gratification type investment, since the avenue to both income and work-life balance is practice ownership, but the first 5-10 years of that is brutal, simultaneously trying to pay your business loan, build a patient base, manage your staff, raise a family/buy a home, etc. etc.

There are many avenues in dentistry but I think the folks who think "Oh, I go to school, I come out and work a 9-5 job and I feel fine and I make good money and I'm set!" couldn't be more wrong.

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I actually really love the job of being a dentist.  I’m not going to say that it’s the best job out there but I very rarely dread going to work.  

My main stress with this career is financial.  And I’m not that even bad off right now.  It’s the future that scares me.  

I was born and raised in Toronto and I’ve started my own family here and (perhaps against my better judgement) recently bought a home here.  

I have a pretty good job situation right now (as far as Toronto is concerned).  My income isn’t sky high but it is sufficient.  But this job will eventually end.  Perhaps in 10 years or perhaps in a month.  I am very certain at that point that I will not be able to find a similar level of income within a reasonable commute from my house.  Then we’ll have to sell the house and move (likely far away).

Also, having just finished a tax return I decided to look at my income history.  I’m 6.5 years out of school.  My income peaked in my second year and has dropped by about 2-3% per year since then.  This is not itself a disaster but it’s moving in the wrong direction and indicative of the current reality.  

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36 minutes ago, Ostracized said:

I actually really love the job of being a dentist.  I’m not going to say that it’s the best job out there but I very rarely dread going to work.  

My main stress with this career is financial.  And I’m not that even bad off right now.  It’s the future that scares me.  

I was born and raised in Toronto and I’ve started my own family here and (perhaps against my better judgement) recently bought a home here.  

I have a pretty good job situation right now (as far as Toronto is concerned).  My income isn’t sky high but it is sufficient.  But this job will eventually end.  Perhaps in 10 years or perhaps in a month.  I am very certain at that point that I will not be able to find a similar level of income within a reasonable commute from my house.  Then we’ll have to sell the house and move (likely far away).

Also, having just finished a tax return I decided to look at my income history.  I’m 6.5 years out of school.  My income peaked in my second year and has dropped by about 2-3% per year since then.  This is not itself a disaster but it’s moving in the wrong direction and indicative of the current reality.  

May I ask why you feel you will lose your job soon? Is it because of the amount of saturation facing the GTA or another reason? 

 

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1 hour ago, VivaColombia said:

May I ask why you feel you will lose your job soon? Is it because of the amount of saturation facing the GTA or another reason? 

 

I work with an older dentist who will not work forever.  I have no plan of buying the practice.  I couldn’t make it work financially.  Although he has no plan to retire right now, eventually he will have to. 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 11/2/2018 at 1:19 PM, DURP said:

In my first year of working experience: I have been working 3 part time associateships for about 9 months in the GTA. There are ups and downs in income from month to month, I am expecting around 120k gross first year out. Finding jobs seems quite competitive, my principle dentists mentioned they get around 80-150 apps for an associate position posted online. 

Ostracized estimate of 0-200k is super realistic

Wow, that sucks. I'm doing my undergrad in UMichigan right now and the dentists/dental students here are telling me that most new grads make over 150k comfortably right after school. Some are saying it's common to get $500-800 USD /day minimum depending on where you sign. But that being said their tuition here is a lot more and getting a dental licence here is a lot more work since it's a series of real patient/typodont board exams in addition to part 1 and part 2.

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20 hours ago, Stethescope said:

https://tst-dentistry.sites.olt.ubc.ca/files/2018/11/International_DMD_Program_Flier-UBC_Dentistry.pdf

 

UBC now opening the door for international applicants to get a DMD in Canada.

Cost of attendance over 100k/year.

Isn't this just allowing international students to apply to their regular DMD program? 

They're not foreign-trained dentists. They're just other students. I don't see how this is a bad thing. Ultimately it's just a moneygrab by UBC but it's not like it increases the number of spots/dentists coming in.

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On 11/19/2018 at 9:15 AM, cleanup said:

Isn't this just allowing international students to apply to their regular DMD program? 

They're not foreign-trained dentists. They're just other students. I don't see how this is a bad thing. Ultimately it's just a moneygrab by UBC but it's not like it increases the number of spots/dentists coming in.

Yeah nothing too significant, just annoying how obvious of a moneygrab it is though 

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On 11/18/2018 at 1:12 PM, Stethescope said:

https://tst-dentistry.sites.olt.ubc.ca/files/2018/11/International_DMD_Program_Flier-UBC_Dentistry.pdf

 

UBC now opening the door for international applicants to get a DMD in Canada.

Cost of attendance over 100k/year.

How come this is not advertised on the official website? FAQ also still says no international students

edit: I lied they just updated it...

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1 hour ago, themuffinman11 said:

Lol, would you enjoy sitting in the same chair hours upon hours typing up code, working pretty much on your own?

to be fair some people truly like that

and to be honest in a private dentistry practice apart from the cordial interactions with patients who won't really talk back to you during the dental work and occasional chat with coworkers you can be a near hermit in dentistry if you wanted to.

- G

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10 hours ago, powerpenguin said:

Sterilization costs keep going up, minimum wage (employee costs) keeps going up, practice prices keep going up. Sometimes I wish I got a CS degree and moved to Seattle.

It was so interesting to me to read that comment. I am a Chemical Engineering graduate (Class of BSc 2011/MSc 2014) and working as a CS Engineer. BUT I am planning to get into a dental school possibly in September 2020. People really do wish what they don't possess... 

BTW, sitting in front of a computer almost the whole day, scrolling up and down in forums to (hopefully) resolve a challenging issue of your product, dealing with nerdy coworkers and managers, and regretting why you haven't studied medical sciences, are all I do at CS, if that's what you wish...

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21 minutes ago, aliparsa said:

It was so interesting to me to read that comment. I am a Chemical Engineering graduate (Class of BSc 2011/MSc 2014) and working as a CS Engineer. BUT I am planning to get into a dental school possibly in September 2020. People really do wish what they don't possess... 

BTW, sitting in front of a computer almost the whole day, scrolling up and down in forums to (hopefully) resolve a challenging issue of your product, dealing with nerdy coworkers and managers, and regretting why you haven't studied medical sciences, are all I do at CS, if that's what you wish...

you studied chemical engeneering and work as a computer science engineer?  

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1 minute ago, member_225 said:

you studied chemical engeneering and work as a computer science engineer?  

That is correct. After my graduation, I moved to Calgary and oil prices dropped crazy. Most petroleum and chemical engineers lost their jobs within a few months of that. Then I moved back to Ontario and I could luckily find a job as a Tester of a medical software package, then I learned more and used the knowledge I had gained by trial-and-error in my teenage time and basically became a software engineer (not a great one though, I don't have the background anyways)...

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15 minutes ago, aliparsa said:

That is correct. After my graduation, I moved to Calgary and oil prices dropped crazy. Most petroleum and chemical engineers lost their jobs within a few months of that. Then I moved back to Ontario and I could luckily find a job as a Tester of a medical software package, then I learned more and used the knowledge I had gained by trial-and-error in my teenage time and basically became a software engineer (not a great one though, I don't have the background anyways)...

I read a statistic a while back about a certain percentage of engineering grads working in a different field than the one they studied. I think it was about 30%, I don't remember exactly 

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15 hours ago, aliparsa said:

It was so interesting to me to read that comment. I am a Chemical Engineering graduate (Class of BSc 2011/MSc 2014) and working as a CS Engineer. BUT I am planning to get into a dental school possibly in September 2020. People really do wish what they don't possess... 

BTW, sitting in front of a computer almost the whole day, scrolling up and down in forums to (hopefully) resolve a challenging issue of your product, dealing with nerdy coworkers and managers, and regretting why you haven't studied medical sciences, are all I do at CS, if that's what you wish...

The grass is always greener on the other side. We should all feel grateful for what we do have and the opportunities that sit before us. That said, people need to be realistic for their expectations of a career. Too often people get in over their heads, get into it for the wrong reasons, expect the wrong thing, and end up dissatisfied or unhappy somehow. There is a heavy focus on these forums on the 'result,' which I understand since it's a massive time & financial investment. But similarly, because it's such a heavy time & financial investment, you can't just enjoy the result. You better enjoy the process, and the process is lifelong. If you don't, you won't last, or you'll be unhappy for years.

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On 7/8/2018 at 11:43 AM, Borntobewild said:

GPs are already doing wisdom teeth, implants, IV sedation. OMFS will likely be hardest hit.

 

Right. And the number of botched, half-drilled, impacted thirds I have seen infuriate the majority of the OMFS residents out there that end up seeing them in clinic to fix someone else's mess. It happens alot.  

I'm biased, but I really have a hard time seeing how OMFS is really affected. T+T are important to private practice OMFS, no doubt, but it's a tiny part of the OMFS scope. Sure orthognathics, trauma, deep neck I&Ds, H&N path may not be as luctrative, but to say that OMFS will be "hardest hit" because some GPs are extracting 3rd molars is ridiculous. The moment most GPs see a "medcially complex" pt that needs some form of an extraction, OMFS is consulted, and rightfully so. OMFS has exhasutive training in general anesthesia (300+ general anestheisa cases) and IV sedation (300+ cases). If things go wrong, is the GP going to be confident to intubate, bag, and adminstered the right meds? Sure the GP has the certificate to administer sedation in the clinic, but are they prepared for the worst?  

For the sake of your pateints, if you are remotly unsure if you can handle it, refer to someone that has the expeince rather than botching it. 

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