The forceps of our minds are clumsy forceps, and crush the truth a little in taking hold of it. (H.G. Wells)

Some 'old-fashioned' things can be very beautiful. With nature photography, I always find black and white even more stunning than colour.



Old-fashioned dentistry, however, is a different story....

Someone (need not be a dentist...) would take an old pair of rusted forceps out of a drawer, put one hand on the patient's forehead, take the bad tooth in the forceps and twist it back and forth until he could hear the tooth break loose. Then a hand full of salt was put it into the hole to keep it from bleeding. General anaesthesia was given in a bottle (hiccup...hiccup...) and often shared by dentist and patient. All teeth were pulled with the same forceps and sometimes it was not cleaned in between...

Well... that was then and this is now, right!?

March 2008: There has been no full time dentist in Kaeo (New Zealand) since the 1970s, so an SOS went out to Auckland's AUT School of Oral Health. A team of three saw thirty patients and pulled 14 teeth.

In our clinic, a simple extraction costs approx. 10 Euros but we only pull if nothing else can be done. And yes, we do clean our instruments.