Root Canal Therapy

(Dr. Tanner and Dr. Edwards work in the same office utilizing the same staff) Dr. Tanner and his staff has got to be the most professional caring people I’ve encountered in dentistry and I’ll tell you why. My circumstances are a bit more unique given my situation. After finishing my military service in 2008, i went 5 years without access to dental care. I, like a lot of military veterans, went through a period of confusion and had a difficult time assimilating with normal civilian life given my experiences in the service. None of what I did in the service transferred to civilian life and for the life of me I couldn’t find work and wasn’t sure what my future had in store. I really didn’t take care of myself as I should have, given the dark cloud that loomed overhead, and my dental health suffered as a result. I was unemployed, didn’t have insurance, had debt due to having to use credit for living expenses. My solution for any dental or gum pain was to brush with hydrogen peroxide. Needless to say, by the time i was able to make it to Dr. Tanner’s office, it was as if a cavity grenade went off in my mouth and my gums were visibly irritated. I was recommended to Dr. Tanner by a coworker of mine who had seen him with his family for quite some time. I was still a temp where I was employed but had dental insurance through the temp agency. It hardly covered anything but I was determined to at the very least get a cleaning. I wasn’t expecting how much work i actually needed done, given that i wasn’t really in any pain. I walked into their office and was immediately greeted by friendly warm staff. Both Helen and Dolores were amazing with me and I was given a tour of the entire office and introduced to the staff. I wasn’t used to that, and it was such a shock to be shown the facility and to meet those who worked there. I was so used to military type dental where they just pump you in and out more as a number than a human being. It was quite refreshing and I was really impressed with the quality of the equipment. My hygienist Carol was very knowledgeable and talked me through everything that was going on in my mouth. She was going to have to do deep scaling to clear away build up and to recover my very irritated gums before any work was to be done on what cavities I had. Luckily none of them were bad enough to need root canals but there were a lot. It was going to be very expensive and my insurance was hardly going to cover it, but i agreed that it had to be done. Dolores was wonderful when working with me on payments and i let her in on my situation. I would never try to use my veteran status to ask for anything or get extra help. I’m far too stubborn and proud for that and i was just trying to let her understand why i couldn’t pay her all at once. She spoke to Dr. Tanner about it and he in turn decided to give me a generous veteran discount. I have to admit that i felt a bit awkward about it (pride), but he thanked me personally for my service and never once did I feel like I was some sort of “charity case” and have always been treated very respectfully and with kindness within that office by everyone. After my deep scaling appointments with Carol, my first round with cavity removals went great with Dr. Tanner and I was having much improvement already with my smile. I was able to keep up with payments that Dolores had set up with me that were very reasonable considering the amount of work I was having done and after a few months was ready for another round of cavity removal. They had to work by quadrants because of the sheer amount of decay that I had in my mouth. Knowing my situation they decided to schedule me for the weekend hours that Dr. Brian Edwards was facilitating once a month. Which has been great for me since I rely on an hourly wage and would normally have to cut hours to come in for dental work. I’ve had 2 weekend visits thus far and both have been just as pleasant as my experiences with Dr Tanner. Dr Edwards and his assistant Kasey do top notch work and each time were able to accomplish a lot with the removal and filling of my cavities. After my first visit, I spoke with Dolores again about billing and she explained to me that Dr. Edwards decided to honor the same discount that Dr. Tanner had given me. Something of which he didn’t have to do, nor was I expecting it. I thanked him for it on my second visit and awkwardly told him how much it helped me and he too was very modest about it and actually thanked ME for being so appreciative. All in all this office has been a great experience for me with truly good people through and through. They reached out to a veteran that has just been trying to bring his quality of life back to where it should be and that means the world to me. I’m just some random guy off of the street for all they know and they treated me as family. They are a very patriotic group who can honestly say they support their veterans.