pavandeep

I've been kind of busy lately with two jobs and working on starting my own dental clinic. Here's what it looks like now:

It needs a little work still.

I was trying to gradually reduce my days at one of my jobs, and was only going in one day a week. I don't know what happened, but now I'm there 3 days a week, and 5 days at the other clinic (some days I go to both). I'm not complaining. It's good to be employed.

The patients at one of the clinics are almost all Punjabi. In dental school, (and at the other clinic too) we called most patients by their first name. Even if the patient was 80+ we would call him "Bob". Imagine calling an elderly Punjabi man by his first name! Not only that, but I can't bring myself to introduce myself as a "Doctor" to the older Punjabi patients, so I usually don't introduce myself at all. It seems a little rude to not introduce yourself, but I know that the receptionist has already told the patient who they're going to see.

One other thing I've come to realize while working with Punjabi patients is that my spoken Punjabi is terrible! When I'm trying to explain something to a patient, and I see a look of confusion on their poor faces I try to listen to what I'm saying. It really doesn't sound very good. My Punjabi is littered with English words, but I think I have improved quite a bit since I started. One of the assistants told me that my Punjabi was really good compared to some of the other dentists who have been there. That's pretty scary.