The Road to: Color Me Rad!

As Haley Charles said,

"Sleep in this Saturday? Not these girls. They got up bright and early to participate in this year’s Color Me Rad 5K hosted at UVU. After some pre-race pictures in their white T shirts they were ready to get them dirty. Savannah and Keala also proudly sported their snazzy tutus, which I hope you all checked out. They have skills."

We Came, We RAN, We Conquered! 

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The Road to RDH: First time facilitating!

I'm facilitator today! Hopefully I did all the facilitator paperwork right. I feel like I have learned a lot this week! It has been fun! I'm going to miss having Brooke as my partner, but we are going to keep going to the football games together :)

What I learned about Brooke:
-She served a mission in Ireland
-She also fell off a bus in said mission in Ireland and broke her hips! OUCH!!!!!!!
-Her favorite superhero is Spiderman
-She twirls batons!

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The Road to RDH: Exams and Health Histories

We have an exam tomorrow in head and neck anatomy! I am nervous about it but I am sure I will do fine! We went over health histories in clinic today and why they are so important. It was so interesting to learn about different medications and treatment alterations. I had no idea that so many medications and systemic conditions affect patients orally!

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The Road to RDH: First presentation!

Day 1 of our first presentations down! We were prepared for our embryology presentation.

One of the students in the other group that presented made tooth rice crispies! How cute is that?

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The Road to RDH: Ergonomics and New Lab Partners!

We got new clinic partners today! My new partner is Brooke, and I think we click pretty well. We've decided to go to the football game together! We are on pretty similar levels and are going to start studying together outside of school. I am so excited to have a study buddy! We are going to work on memorizing the tooth numbering which I am pretty happy about. I feel behind in that area because I have never been a dental assistant and I feel like everyone knows the tooth numbering but me!

Anyway, we are learning ergonomics this week. (Patient-operator positioning, instrument grasp, etc.) I had no idea that dental hygiene was so hard on the body!!! I am so grateful I am being taught how to take care of myself so I can have a long career without injury.

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The Road to RDH: Tooth Anatomy!

Our teeth are so cool guys! Take care of yours! Here is a drawing I did of a molar's cross-section!

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The Road to RDH: Infection Control!

We are learning INFECTION CONTROL. We wear soo much personal protective equipment and place a million barriers! I felt like this:

(But I love it)

I went to extra clinic this morning. I think it will be an extremely useful tool for me throughout this program! I have been learning how to properly place barriers and take them down in my unit! Infection control is so important so I am glad that this is what we are learning first. I want to make sure I keep my patients (and myself) healthy and happy! I passed off my post-operative infection control LE in extra clinic and my pre-operative infection control PE in clinic. (Extra clinic is the best! Such a time saver and stress reliever!)

What I've learned about my partner Makenzi:
-She's from here
-She's been seeing the same guy for 6+ years and they're going to get married!
-She's really active and funny (but also really shy at first!)

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The Road to RDH: First Day of Pre-Clinic!

Today we oriented ourselves with the clinic and were put into teams! I have 10 girls in my team and we are all so excited! It was a lot of fun getting to know everyone. My partner's name is Makenzi and I think she is great. We learned we have extra clinic time available to us to help us practice/pass things off. I am going to utilize the extra clinic whenever I can so I can be the best I can!

I also passed off an LE even though I really didn't think I would!! That was exciting. I definitely need to look over the second half of it a lot tonight before I try to do my PE tomorrow. Actually, my whole team passed off at least one LE today so we are on top of things! Go Silver Team! I can't wait to start learning the basics of scaling teeth!

Some vocabulary for you:
LE: Learning Experience. (Kind of like a quiz)
PE: Process Evaluation. (Kind of like a test)

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The Road to RDH: First Day of UCDH!!!

First day of school! First day of school! Just 20 months until I achieve my dream of being a dental hygienist!!

Welcome class of 2015! We are all so excited to be here!

The first day of school was a good way for us all to get oriented, introduced to each other, and to vote on a class motto. Our class motto is We Came, We Cleaned, We Conquered!

A friend of mine from BYU got accepted into the same program as I did (yay!), so I was excited to know I already had 1 friend going into it, and I am SO excited to make 58 new friends!

I'm not the only one who is excited. Here are some other students' posts:

• Utah here I come! I am so blessed that my dream is coming true. One step closer to being a dental Hygentist! Thank you to everyone who has been there for me through it all! Ill miss Washington but I am ready for this new adventure! -Keala Bingham
• "I cannot wait to wear scrubs everyday." - Lindsey Jensen
• "First day of Dental Hygiene school... Or prison? #jailbird" - Cathy Chan
• It's finally happening - Natalie Thomsen
• All of my hard work has finally paid off! I just got my acceptance letter to Utah College of Dental Hygiene! I could not be more excited!! I cannot wait to start a new journey and finally be studying what I love and have be working hard for! - Andrea DeMers

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