New York City Docs & Dentists

Hello -- this is a forum where you are encouraged to share recommendations and experiences with New York City doctors and dentists. Currently looking for a good oral surgeon for a wisdom tooth -- I live in Brooklyn and I'm not about to go to any random clinic on the corner.

All tips welcome. Thanks!

i recommend dr. zizmor

i lol'd

"Sometimes he takes out my wisdom teeth"

I feel sort of poor and lazy now: I just gave some guy in Morningside Heights cash to spend about 40 seconds slicing my gums and yanking out my wisdom teeth. Then he handed me some gauze, patted me on the back, and shoved me out of the office. I think the place was called "ToothSavers," as if they were admitting that they weren't much of a long-term dental health joint, and were pretty much only there to make sure nothing fell out.

I have to admit, though, I was impressed with the guy who did it: one poke to see if I could feel anything, then slash-slash, yank-yank, and okay, get going. "That was fast," I said, and he just said "thirty years" in this way that suggested this was about 25 more years than were necessary to get really fucking sick of teeth and start coming after them all Predator-style.

Steve Martin should do one more dentist movie, playing that guy.

This guy would be better played by Steve Harvey.

wow.

so you didn't go under, he just gave you topical stuff?

how do you feel now? i'm assuming he doesn't take insurance...

http://theassociation.blogs.com/the_association/images/2008/03/31/drspaceman.jpg

heard good things about this guy

This was a little while ago, Surmounter. I didn't go under -- I've never been under -- and don't think anyone should need to for routine extraction of wisdom teeth. I have an embarrassingly low tolerance for pain and I've previously had impacted wisdom teeth broken and removed piece by piece without feeling any more than some uncomfortable yanking of the jaw: a few shots of novocaine and some light "relaxing" gas do the job just fine.

He did take insurance, but my dental insurance was extremely poor and hassle-filled, and I needed these removed in a hurry, so I just paid for it. Hence the cheap dentist. The only surprise was that I was already drugged up when I realized that the price I'd been quoted ($400) was actually per tooth. (I actually paid while the gas was on, which is good thinking on their part.)

I think the moral of this story is that if your wisdom teeth are not impacted, and not involved in any deeper or more complex situation than just needing to be yanked, you do not need to worry too much about how it gets done. You will sit in a chair for twenty minutes and then someone will gouge the gums away from your teeth and crack them out with a little metal thing. You could nearly do it yourself. And then there will be gauze and cleaning and bleeding and healing, which you will do yourself. So don't worry about it too much.

It would be nice to go somewhere that lets you sit and rinse for a few minutes, though, because I had like a ten-minute walk home where I was spitting huge globs of blood on the sidewalk and getting some serious looks from people.

:o nabisco's Johnny Knoxville moment!

hahaha. thx

It would be nice to go somewhere that lets you sit and rinse for a few minutes, though, because I had like a ten-minute walk home where I was spitting huge globs of blood on the sidewalk and getting some serious looks from people.

you couldn't find a starbucks anywhere?

I have to admit, though, I was impressed with the guy who did it: one poke to see if I could feel anything, then slash-slash, yank-yank, and okay, get going. "That was fast," I said, and he just said "thirty years" in this way that suggested this was about 25 more years than were necessary to get really fucking sick of teeth and start coming after them all Predator-style.

ha ha. whenever i go to the dentist it just makes me think how easy it is, because it's all tools and painful audible scraping, rather than incisive finger magic. maybe the toothsaves guy thought the same thing and set himself up a couple of years back.

i've been going to DOCS for medical check ups and stuff. it is pretty fine, and open a lot.

Please note that I have no medical/dental experience to base my "moral" on -- if someone who does comes along and says that actually there are Major Dangers that can develop from poorly done tooth-yanking, then I apologize. I mean, maybe there are nerve dangers I'm unaware of, or bad things that can happen to your jaw. I do know a guy who somehow wound up with an unfilled pocket of bacteria that ate away at his jaw and required some kind of hardcore corrective surgery. But by and large it's my sense that pulling normal wisdom teeth is not too ridiculously complicated and can be done decently by lots of people.

So long as I'm telling tooth stories let me also note that I had my bottom wisdom teeth broken and pulled about 15 years ago by a big proper expensive dentist, and then this summer, in Chicago, I felt little burr in my gums where one of those teeth had been, getting more and more annoying over a couple days, and then eventually it came out and it was, so far as I could tell, a tiny little shard of tooth. I have this weird feeling that it had been left down in there and then, over 15 years, gradually migrated to the surface and out.

Ten minutes later, I met deej.

i am going to imagine that post as a magical realist story where deej was made out of a tooth

i love my dentist: dr. kroch4k. he's really good if you're phobic.

ooh lots of good stuff on him. and he's cute.

ok so i'd love to go to dr. kroch4k but he's too expensive for me. who else has a regular old dentist in nyc who won't scare me? i need someone who takes insurance

BTW, if anyone needs a physician -- i like Peter Charap, who my boyfriend and i both see. central park west.

http://www.rateitall.com/i-427178-charap-peter-md.aspx

http://13.media.tumblr.com/GufDaCmWqcer3v2grpIUbWAK_400.jpg

(dude is in my neighborhood, btw)

terrible

i'm trying to find a doctor in brooklyn. a female.

anyone recommend a general practitioner/primary care physician?

Supposedly Jill Pentecostas is amazing. brooklyn based tho, i forget if you're BK or not

thx! (i am in bk btw)

no problem! you're prolly looking for a guy tho. my BF still really likes Peter Charap but he's uptown manhattan.

but if u need a good vet, i have just the place!

any dermos in bk?

gay doctors ?

My doctor has some kind of order of merit from Cote d'Ivoire on his office wall; it's got a little ribbon and a medal and everything. I think it was for some kind of public health work but no idea what exactly.

order of merit from Cote d'Ivoire

is this the latest euphemism for gay?

I doubt it, but you could go up to 70th St and ask him!

anyone recommend an orthopedic surgeon?