As a person who is terrified of dentists, I was unbelievably impressed by the care I got at Everwell. I needed to get a filling replaced after the old one fell out. Despite me being a new patient, they managed to get me in the very next day! I was seen by Dr. Heys and Silvana (dental assistant). I was told I had to get the tooth extracted since it had already started decaying/getting infected. The last time I had a tooth removed was in elementary school, which left me traumatized and hating going to the dentist. Initially, my answer was a solid no. I wanted ample sedation, and even then, I was ambivalent. With my board exam coming up, I also didn't want to lose even a few hours of studying, leaving me with 2 options: local anesthetics or nitrous (laughing gas). Although it turned out they don't carry nitrous, Dr. Heys personally called another dentist for me that she knew was good, had nitrous, and took my insurance - they would be able to get me in next week. Meanwhile, Silvana continued to reassure me that Dr. Heys is very gentle and that this would be a quick and simple procedure. She spent what must've been at least 30min-1h comforting me and answering my incessant questions (this was well beyond my appointment time). To my own surprise, I eventually consented.
They gave me Bose noise-cancelling headphones playing music of my choice to calm me down, dark-tinted glasses to block out the overhead light, and continuously encouraged/reassured me throughout the entire process. At the time, I was still an anxious mess (completely a me-problem), so I'm very sorry they had to put up with that - but in retrospect, it was just as they said - no pain, just pressure. If I eliminated all internal anxieties, that was one of the most pain-free, benign dentist appointments I've ever had. I was told that I'd be sore the next day and that I should stick to mushy foods for the time being (my friends even warned me it'd be miserable). Turns out, the worst part, ironically, was when my mouth was still numb and felt like a chipmunk cheek. I prophylactically took some ibuprofen as the numbness wore off and by that night, I was pretty much pain-free and eating solid foods (bad patient, I know...).
To top it all off, I got a card in the mail from Dr. Heys a few days later with a personalized hand-written note welcoming me to the practice. Everwell definitely went above and beyond my expectations. And who knows - this might be the one place to breakdown my wall of dental anxiety.
tl;dr:
- Empathetic, friendly, and caring staff that go above and beyond
- Great at dealing with super anxious patients
- High-quality work with great pain-control read more