Thank you Cambridge Smiles, Dr. Tenorio, and the awesome reception staff and hygienist I worked…read morewith! I had a pain-free wisdom tooth extraction here! The attentiveness, the follow-through, the genuine care! I cannot say enough good things about these folks.
I was blown away by how quickly I was seen here. I walked into this office with wisdom tooth area pain. While my partner is a patient with Cambridge Smiles, I had never been seen at this office prior to my dental emergency. I didn't know what to expect, but despite their full schedule they checked me out immediately (within the hour), and squeezed me in for an appointment that day. Dr. Tenorio made sure I got the medicine I needed to quiet the infection and deal with the immediate pain. Dr. Tenorio is the best dentist I have ever had, listening intently and carefully to my experience, and taking the time to really understand what I needed - not only to get me to a happy health outcome, but also to understand how I could be most comfortable in getting there. He explained to me that the infection makes for a "hot tooth" which not only means more pain due to the hyperactive nerves, but also makes my tooth environment acidic rendering the anesthetic (a weak base) largely inactive. So the plan was to take antibiotics for a few days, get the infection is below some threshold, and hopefully ensure my extraction was relatively painless. (It was entirely painless! Thanks Dr. Tenorio!)
Dr. Tenorio's knowledge of dentistry is incredible and he took the time to explain everything that was going on, which was what I needed to be at ease. As a patient, I was given access to their office's 24 hour emergency dental line that would ring to the dentist even during off hours if I needed it. Dr. Tenorio also called to check in on my pain levels and progress as I was taking the antibiotic. Never in my life have I had a dentist this committed and attentive. My typical experience of medical care overall is that nobody cares about your health outcomes more than you, but my experience here in this situation is that maybe Dr. Tenorio does. He completely alleviated my near-term dental pain by changing up the schedule on which I was taking acetaminophin / ibuprofen and it was way more effective the way he suggested. When I had expressed a desire to get all the wisdom teeth I'd need out simultaneously (I had been hearing such scary stories of really tough painful extractions from friends and family and I really didn't want to do it twice) he referred me to a great oral surgeon he works closely with. I was scared of extraction though, so I didn't follow up with the oral surgeon. Dr. Tenorio and the office must have followed up with that other office, realized that I hadn't been scheduled, and called me to check in and see if I needed help with next steps. When the other dental surgeon didn't have any availability within the month to get both of my teeth removed simultaneously, Dr. Tenorio talked with me on the phone to help make a plan to get my immediate situation resolved. I ended up scheduling an extraction of just the affected tooth that week with Dr. Tenorio in the Cambridge Smiles office. By calling to check in again, he was also able to know that I had upcoming air travel which I didn't realize could be a risk for me immediately after extraction and he moved the schedule around to make sure I'd be good to go.
Dr. Tenorio extracted my wisdom tooth, in the Cambridge Smiles office, under local anesthetic. He explained the technique he was going to use to lift the tooth using only hand implements (no drills!) and said that if there were any sign of complication risk he would stop rather than risk shattering the roots and making a mess of shards that would require complicated emergency dental work. I experienced no pain whatsoever during the extraction, and that's entirely because he was so sensitive to my experience. I was really nervous to have my wisdom tooth removed, I remember seeing people with swollen, bruised faces having later infections in the area of the tooth removal... but my experience was completely different. No pain, no visible swelling, no bruising, no complications whatsoever. My tooth came out intact in one piece within a few minutes, and all I felt was pressure - no pain at all! Dr. Tenorio explained how infection can cause gums to be inflamed and kind of loosen their hold on teeth for a time, which helped to make my extraction immediately post-infection particularly easy. I had my extraction on a Friday and Dr. Tenorio even called to check in on me over the weekend to see how I was feeling afterwords. At that point I was already feeling so much better! He had me scheduled for a follow up the next week just to make sure I was healing well and everything looked great and it really was. Thank you to Dr. Tenorio and the Cambridge Smiles team!
