The was a LSC dentist dinner last Monday. I’m not particularly fond of social events but I attended anyway. It was a nice event with a few highlights.

1. Prof. Lim Cheung also attended LSC, surprisingly.

2. I met Luki and had a quality chat with him.

3. Another surprise: Martin’s dad also came and we chatted for a while too.

4. The event was held in Cordis Hotel’s Chinese restaurant. The whole dinner was sponsored by GSK; we didn’t have to pay a penny. I never realized being a dentist can be so convenient: a medical supplies company would sponsor a private event. Perhaps next time when there’s Group 5.6 re-U dinner, I should ask P&G to sponsor us.

Many dentists, old and young, were invited to give some sharing. Luckily I wasn’t one of them. But this made me wonder: what would I have said had I been invited to speak?

It should go something like this:

I finished my MFDS exams earlier this year. I’ve forgotten most of the knowledge I studied during the exams, but one thing that made an impression was about showing empathy. Our patients come to see us for a reason. Solving dental problems is one of them, but what makes them think we’re good dentists is when we stand in their shoes and perhaps say something that will somehow lessen the pain they feel. It’s a dentist’s job to offer hope, to share the notion that losing one tooth is not the end of the world, but the beginning of a (costly) journey towards oral health.

This led to the second important message: what’s my advice having practised dentistry for four years?

Four words: 毋忘初衷. I guess this is something like SJ’s “stay hungry, stay foolish.” When I just started, I wanted to get everything done perfectly. Every cavity should be filled precisely; every root canal should be negotiated down to the correct working length; every crown margin should have exactly 1mm smooth chamfer. But very often we just performed inferiorly, feeling 力不從心. After four years our clinical skills should have improved, and we work more quickly. It’s easy to fall into this trap: speed is everything; quality is secondary. No, that shouldn’t be the case. As our skills improve we should endeavour to perform every procedures precisely. We shouldn’t forget what we strived for in the beginning.

Well luckily I wasn’t invited to speak. Otherwise everyone’d think I’m a fool.

PS When I was chairman of Western Culture Club I organized a “western lunch gathering” and invited Brother Thomas to the event too. There was a quiz towards the end of the lunch, and Peter Ball asked this question: what are the first three words in the Holy Bible. No one was aware of that, not even BT. The answer? “IN THE BEGINNING God created the heavens and the earth.”