“In the absence of a government Denticare Program there’s a perfect opportunity for dentists themselves to volunteer their services to transform Aboriginal lives,” writes “Gadfly” columnist ROBERT MACKLIN.

I USED to hate all dentists with a passion. Admittedly, we got off to a bad start. 

My first dentist was my hometown (Brisbane) godfather, chosen at the time as my parents’ best friend, Ernie Wagner. He did my teeth for free. Trouble is, they had a calamitous falling out with Ernie who played “Monopoly” like Uncle Scrooge.

They rarely spoke thereafter. But I stayed “godson” and I detected a painful change in attitude. At the time, dentists used an electric foot pedal to power the drill and Ernie was in such a hurry to get to his paying customers that he didn’t always wait till the drill reached top speed before he sank it into my latest pre-fluoride cavity. 

I sometimes ducked appointments and I paid for it in later life when we moved south.

However, in Canberra I’ve been blessed by a very caring and competent cohort of men and women professionals whose principal concern seems to be making the dental experience as pain free as possible. But now the boot is on the other foot. It is the dentists who are suffering.

The stats are deeply troubling. According to their association, one in six practitioners reported thoughts of suicide in the past 12 months; and over the longer term 5.6 per cent reported making an attempt to end their lives. A quarter of them experienced “burnout” and nearly 12 per cent suffered depression and anxiety disorder, 32 per cent with moderate-severe psychological distress and 60 per cent with psychiatric morbidity.

So, what causes this and what’s to be done about it?

Their association is not much help. All they can suggest is “advocacy and education to ensure practitioners can seek the appropriate support they need” and they send their members the addresses of Lifeline, Beyond Blue and the other do-gooders we all know about anyway.

As it happens, I had an appointment last week with my gentle lady drill sergeant and we talked briefly around the protruding instruments. That’s when I realised just how debilitated they’ve become. Yet the solution is staring them in the face, and they don’t have the energy or the gumption to grab it and run.

It’s on our TV screens almost every day as the phony “debate” about the Voice produces Aboriginal spokespeople from around the nation. While the adults in the regional and outback areas talk perfect sense, their message is lost since they’re not just dentally challenged, they are crippled and maimed. 

I’m told that in their final year of study, dental students do visit some distant centres such as Brewarrina for a couple of weeks, where they practise their newly acquired skills on the needy without charge. 

Truth is, they don’t need students filling caries, but experts reconstructing their broken dentition. Yet sadly, there seems to be a view that they have made an appropriate contribution to the community; thereafter, the devil takes the hindmost. 

This is in stark contrast to some of the other healing professions. Volunteer surgeons and physicians are doing Australia (and themselves) proud with annual expeditions to the less fortunate.

In the absence of a government Denticare Program (to the federal government’s shame) there’s a perfect opportunity for dentists themselves to volunteer their services to transform Aboriginal lives. In so doing, they would not only restore a sense of worth and pride in their profession, they would raise their own morale and garner the warm respect of the Australian community. 

Either way, it sure beats Ernie Wagner’s “Monopoly” syndrome.

robert@robertmacklin.com