Liz,

I just read the article and I will be happy to post a comment as a dentist and an oral cancer survivior.

Although the outcome was not what you had hoped for, you have accomplished a great deal by bringing this dentist's failure to diagnose into the public eye. You should be proud of what you have done.


Jerry

Thanks Jerry

I am lying in bed(its 4pm)at the moment.I had a bit of a funny turn while i was at the hospice this morning and i was violently sick.My boss ordered me home.She said i look exhausted,emotionally fraught and unwell.I said thanks lol.

I have to be honest and say i havent slept well for months,and hardly at all for the last week.The committees findings have absolutely wiped the floor with me,and no matter how many times i hear that i did good,my sorrow at the implications for the rest of you is just devastating.I sooooo wanted this case to be held up as a benchmark case for the whole world to see.When i think of it,which i do all the time,it feels like a great big door has been slammed in my face,and you are all going to have to fight even harder for increased awarenes in the dental profession.

I have this sneaky feeling that i have no where to hide any more when it comes to accepting Robs death.Finally i have nothing left to do.Its really all over,and its quite painful .I have put my grief in a box for 13 months,and this seems to have lifted the lid off it good and proper.

The hospice are insisting that i get counselling now,and this seems such an admission of weakness,but i will stay here in bed and try to get some rest,a least until tomorrow,when i am due back at the hospice, and i have managed to sleep for three hours so far.

Robs struggle to live which i know some may think wasnt all that valient,will haunt me forever,but more than that the circumstances of every person here will keep me fighting this cancer every opportunity i get.

I have written to the lawyers,who totally agree that the decision stinks, and they are going to raise my concerns about the verdict with the committee.Robin had had his ulcer for four weeks before his first visit in May,so by the time of the second visit,on the 15th May he had already had it 6 weeks ,and i CANNOT see how he got away with not referring him ,and not making note of the status of the ulcer and i cant see how they can state so categorically that he would have died anyway,what the hell are they clairvoyant.Why do these people assume that it was an automatic death sentence?
The General Dental Council's whole case revolved around these points and they seem to have just ignored them. There is no appeal however so nothing will change.

Your interest and support have been the one constant that has kept me going through this,and i am so sorry it didnt turn out better for all of us.

love and hugs to one and all

liz

Getting some help is NOT an admission of weakness. You have been in a long and devastating battle. If you weren't showing signs of wear-you wouldn't be normal. Please let the good people at hospice help you. Rob did fight valiently with you right by his side. Wereas he is at peace-you are still fighting. Please take care of yourself now and with the "lid lifted off your grief" let it go. You can still be there to fight for awareness but you must also fight for yourself and your peace of mind.

God bless you,
Sue

Liz.....after being such a loving caretaker to Rob you know that you must "love" yourself a little more now and follow all good and loving advice to take care of YOU.

I have emailed you about my feelings about your case, but for others....I, (and many of you) am also the victim of an ill-trained dentist, who, even when presented with full-blown SCC that had spread from the outside of my gums, to the inside, and then to the palate, NEVER even considered that it was malignant, cauterized it, and when challenged the next day, said that it must be periodontal disease!

I considered filing a lawsuit, and in some wave of false "honor," felt that it was a negative thing to do, when I needed to focus positively on my own recovery. By the time I saw clearly that this individual was guilty of a "failure to diagnose," the statute of limitations had passed (one year.) I am very disappointed that I delayed taking this action, because the more I read here, the more I realize that this is an epidemic! There are many, many wonderful, well-trained, motivated dentists (ie. Jerry and Mike!) but we are seeing that oral cancer doesn't seem to be one of the areas in which dentists are adequately trained.

Would we do better to focus our energies on the dental schools?? or to mount a two-pronged attack: both the schools AND the individuals.

One of the best ways to reach the individuals, it seems to me, is through the local dental societies. Each of us can offer to speak at their regular meeting.....take some OCF brochures.....and answer questions about the impact of oral cancer on our lives, and how it might have been different with a properly trained dental professional.

This same approach should be applied to the assistants....the hygeinists...since they are often the first, and sometimes the only, ones to see a patient.

Liz, you are in my prayers. I can see that you wanted to succeed in this to somehow find justice for Rob. YOU DID! You can't help it if a small group sees it a different way. They, at least, did admit that the dentist was ill-trained in this area. I hope that somehow the publicity will hurt him in his pocketbook. Bad publicity is the kiss of death for a medical or dental professional, and word of mouth is as powerful as the press.

I haven't intended to ruin my dentist's life, but if someone asks me sincerely who my dentist was, I will tell them. I haven't written to the newspaper with his name or anything like that, but I have written an article (which I never sent for publication, since so many people here would know exactly whom I was writing about) about the importance of training for the dental professionals, and the importance of individual awareness of the signs of oral cancer and the importance of being certain that you are getting an expert oral cancer screening.

Since so many of these cancers go un-diagnosed for so long, it is vital, of course, that the public become aware of the warning signs, as well as of the importance of choosing their dentist well!

You can publicize all of these things. And if you are so moved, you can offer to share the name of Rob's dentist if a person wants to call you. (You might be sued for libel if you publish it in the paper!)

Even now that cancer is getting quite a lot of attention, it is a crime how little publicity this terrible form of the disease is getting.

Blahblah........I am not saying anything that the rest of you don't already know. I get on a roll and then I begin to RANT! Arghhhhhhhhh!!! It makes me so mad! and then for Liz to be so misunderstood just adds fuel to my fire!

Liz.......you are a champ in all our books! and you did bring the issue into the public eye. That is a great service, and you never know just how it might affect others.

You are in our hearts. You KNOW that, don't you?? I hope so.

XO

I was just reading some of the comments. It is surprising where all they came from. From Slovenia to China. There are quite a few Countries represented. I read a couple that favor the Dentist somewhat .

Jim i have read the comments and i noticed that none of the comments posted by anyone here have been shown ,neither have either of the two i have sent ,or friends of mine from australia.i wonder why?

Hi Liz,
Anything to do with being a member. I cut and pasted this response from the paper when I sent a comment around 18 hours ago??

[/quote]

I also tried to post a test comment initally on the Mail Online and this is what came up. Will check later

Thank you!
Thank you for adding a comment to Mail Online.

All contributions by [b]members are pre-moderated. MailOnline receives thousands of messages every day so please be patient. [/b]

Not sure what they mean by members???

[/quote]

I have just read a comment by a girl from the mouth cancer foundation that she posted yesterday afternoon ,so maybe its just taking time for them to appear.Lets wait and see.

I occasionally moderate comments for one of my employer's politics blogs. We read all comments for offensive language, libel, etc., then hit the "publish comment" box and wait while the creaky software does whatever it does (slowly) to put the comment on the page. It is far more time-consuming than you might think.

I posted a comment this morning. I just checked and there are none dated 9/9, yet.

Jerry