I feel like I've been neglecting Mitch and all his accomplishments, in lieu of all the excitment this year with Addie and her milestones, so I thought I might dedicate a post to Mitch's first successful year of dental school at Marquette University.
His first semester he learned how to take radiographs (x- rays), he learned how to clean teeth, although all of his work the first semester was done on fake teeth.In all of his semesters he has had what the students nicknamed PRES/RES or preservations and restorations, of teeth such as drilling cavities, filling cavities etc. Had classes like Histology (study of tissues), Biochemistry he was lucky enough to get out of because he had taken it before, and a Fundumental Class of Dentistry that included Bio material, nutrition, radiology, developmental biology & a clinical rounds class that discusses moch clinical scenarios.Because he didn't have to take Biochemistry he feels like school wise this semester has been his easiest, but as Addie was born this semester as well, it made it a little more interesting and busy too.
His second semester he learned about some Behavioral sciences, Cariology or the study of cavities, he did some Periodontal or gum studies, and had course work in Oral biology and gross anatomy that focuses on the head and neck, but also touched on body cavities and organ systems.He also had the clinical rounds class again and continued training on cleaning teeth on manakins and taking radiographs. He also got to go into the clinic and do some assisting to the older students. He feels the second semester was harder because he had more credit hours to do, but he also thinks that his second semester was sucsessful because he really buckled down and studied hard.
The summer semester by far has been the most trying semester for him. The bane of his existence has been the Dentures course. It was only two credits but he says the work he was doing made i feel like it was 8 credits. He worked on a lot of hands on projects like making a pair of dentures for a patient, creating casts and replicas of his own mouth, and making a whitening tray for himself from the molds of his mouth. He also got to do his first Prophy(where he cleaned his first live patients teeth). He also had the opportunity to go to the AIDS clinic downtown and learned how people are managing there disease and how dentists can help. During the summer semester he spent a lot of time at home working on his dentures and other projects. He even bought a propane torch so he could melt the wax and do other things for his projects, which he says was a highlight.This is a pictures of his teeth that he shaped and made.The yellow is the mold and the white and pink is all the work that Mitch did. They even have to make the gums look exactly the same, they even give them a stippled appearance! Lots of work went into these.


So that's his first year in a nut shell.
He's had three weeks of this summer to spend with his family and we've had lots of fun while he's been home with us. He heads back to start his second year this upcoming Monday. Good luck babe, Addie and I will miss having you home during the day!