Maya Angelou said, “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”
It is the small things that we can do that make the biggest difference. Each year my team and I identify about a dozen patients that recently lost a spouse or were diagnosed with an illness. We assemble a gift basket of things we made and crafted. My whole team and I spend a Saturday together dropping off these baskets and visiting these patients. These patients will remember how we made them feel.
In our community, we may have the ability to reach out to local dental assisting or hygiene schools to offer help. The schools would be delighted to have a dentist teach a lesson or attend a hands-on lab. I recently taught a composite class to the EFDA students at the Greater Altoona & Technology Center. They were eager to learn and apply the lesson that day in the lab.
Being a part of PAGD has taught me the way to help others. I have learned from many mentors including Drs. Drew Shulman, Rich DeForno, Rick Knowlton, and Carl Steinberg. We have the ability to be mentors in our own group.
The dentists I have met in PAGD go out of their way to care for their patients. They use the education learned through our PEAK program to better serve the patient’s needs. This education can provide competency to do procedures so they don’t have to see a specialist, or make a procedure more comfortable. These are just some examples of the benefits of PEAK.
One of my visions for PAGD is to develop and start a mentorship program. We have so much talent in PAGD from which younger or newer dentists to the group would benefit. I encourage you to invite a dentist friend to our PEAK group so we keep growing. I would like to hear from you if you would be interested in being a mentor to another dentist.
