Mike Machuga is a petty little man who should have retired long ago. Based on our private conversations, I would actually have to say that he should have never been a dentist in the first place. He has the demeanor and charm of an alcoholic highschool woodshop teacher. He cares nothing for his patients, only his bank account. When faced with criticism he becomes rude and full of denial, like a child. No integrity. Not at all respectable. Mike Machuga is a snake oil huckster.
His assistant, Patty, is just as bad. She cant read an x-ray. Her impressions lead to crooked and painful partials being made. None of them fit. She likes to try and finish sentences when people talk to her and ramble on about herself. Pretty sure she got her degree online. She refuses to pronounce my name correctly despite correcting her many times. Patty needs to go back to doing hair so that her lazy mistakes can grow back.
When ordering my upper partial, they read my xray backwards. On the day of my extractions, they changed which teeth were being pulled to cover for their mistake. For months Mike strung me along, trying to argue that one of my teeth was a molar 3 when it was actually a molar 2. He would go back and forth, from admission to denial, saying we would do new impressions and then the next time saying the opposite again.
Needless to say one side of my mouth now has 8 teeth, cramming a whole extra molar where my bicuspids (that were supposed to remain) used to be. The other side has 6 and curls up under the back of my jawline and is pushing the bottom teeth in at an angle. The overbite and crooked contour produced by having the wrong teeth in the wrong places leave me with over a cm of overbite that is visible from 20 feet away. Eating is impossible. Constantly feels like my face is getting pulled on, wrenching it to the side. While wearing them I can stick my tongue through the gap on the 6-toothed side with my tongue, it doesnt line up or make contact when my jaw is closed. He told me the scientific name of the tendon where the skull connects to the jaw when I told him the incorrectly made partials were causing extreme stress and pain in that area, rather than do anything about it. What a sicko.
He actually had the nerve and the incompetence to try arguing that I 'needed proof' that i had 3 wisdom teeth removed 20 years ago. Sadly, if the fools could figure out which side of their own X-Ray is which they would realize they had the evidence the entire time. Despite his ego he still finds it easier to sleep at night by refusing to remake the partial. The bottom was made incorrectly as well, again rotated off center but not quite as badly. It cut into my gums so badly that they bled and scabbed up. It took two months before I was able to get them in or out without massive amounts of pain and damage. When trying to get the piece adjusted, Mike would lather up my gums with coracaine... the numbing agent... covering the fact that his adjustments were not going to work. He actually laughed about it, after calling me an asshole and telling me he could "stick a block of wood in my mouth" if he really wanted to.
Mike is everything bad about his industry. He is a cold incompetent and pathetic liar. When pressed he will deflect with some random medical anatomical term for some portion of the mouth to make himself sound like he knows what he's talking about. Like when someone is bleeding from the inside of their mouth they give a damn about the term gingiva vs 'gums'. That level of detachment is a little unnerving.
Now he wants me to remove the rest of my remaining top teeth to cover for his mistake, refusing to simply remake the partial correctly. Who ever heard of dentures that need to be taken out of the mouth to eat? read more