Everyday Oral Surgery

The etiology, diagnosis, and treatment of temporomandibular joint (TMJ) and orofacial pain disorders are frequently challenging, and misdiagnosis and multiple failed treatments are common in this patient population. Today, we are joined by Dr. Louis Mercuri, an experienced oral maxillofacial surgeon, Clinical Consultant for TMJ Concepts, and Visiting Professor at Rush University Medical Center in...

Suturing has a variety of purposes; it helps to quicken the healing process, minimize bleeding, and hold things in place. There are also a number of different categories that sutures fall into, for example, natural, synthetic, resorbable, and non-resorbable. In today’s episode, I’m joined by my brother, Dr. Jake Stucki, for a discussion around the basics of suturing, and some of the suturing techn...

In today’s episode we are joined by Dr. Aaron Liddell, a repeat guest on the podcast; because he has so much valuable knowledge to share one episode wasn’t enough! The main focus of our conversation today is fractures. Over the past few years, and particularly since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, Aaron has noticed an increase in the number of fracture cases that he is being called in to treat...

Today, we are joined by Dr. Ian Lehrer, an oral maxillofacial surgeon practicing in Dana Point, California. In this episode, we discuss how to prepare to join a practice after you have completed your residency program. Dr. Lehrer has some valuable and practical tips to share, including the value of keeping in touch with your upper level residents and attending meetings at the American Association...

Dr. Elda Fisher, our guest on today’s show, works with a highly disenfranchised cohort. Although transgender people make up 0.6% of the US population, they struggle with a lack of access to the kind of healthcare that Elda specializes in; facial gender affirmation surgery. As Elda explains, maxillofacial surgeons are uniquely qualified to do this type of surgery, and she is hopeful that in the fut...

Today we are joined by oral and maxillofacial surgeon Dr. Myron Tucker. Dr. Tucker had a private practice in North Carolina for 18 years before he stepped away from full time surgery in 2009. Our guest has had a prolific career on the research side of the business, publishing a number of textbooks and offering his experience to support to students of the science. In our conversation, we get to hea...

In Today's episode of Everyday Oral Surgery, we take a look at how oral surgeons who run their own practice are uniquely positioned to benefit from the many perks and points that various credit cards have to offer. We welcome back an old friend of the show, Dr. Scott Weiskopf, who has been using credit cards in his practice for many years to save tens of thousands of dollars on first-class tr...

Oral and maxillofacial surgeons are currently able to sedate patients and operate on them, although that privilege is under threat due to safety concerns. Dr. Robert Bosack, who has been a surgeon since before Mellampati scores were invented, is passionate about enhancing safety protocols for surgeons in order to preserve the right to anaesthetize and operate, and of course, to ensure minimal trag...

Today’s guest is not only an oral surgeon, but an author and an MBA graduate as well. Dr. Dean DeLuke spent 30 years in private practice before transitioning to full-time academia, which is where he has spent the last 10 years. Dean explains what he loves so much about being an academic, and why he would recommend it to any oral surgeons on a part-time or full-time basis. He also shares how having...

There is still some stigma that exists around oral surgeons performing cosmetic surgery, but not nearly as much as there once was, and that is largely due to today’s guest, Joe Niamtu. Joe developed a love for cosmetic facial surgery while doing his residency, but he had to fight for the right to pursue his dreams. Luckily Joe is not someone who takes no for an answer, and after a lawsuit and a ch...

Oral surgeons, as our title suggests, belong in the operating room. Unfortunately, an increasing number of oral surgeons are spending more and more time in their offices and less and less time in theatre. This is something that greatly concerns today's guest, Dr. Morton Goldberg, who struggled for many years alongside other professionals to successfully lift the oral surgery profession out of...

Today’s guest, Dr . Stephen Saxe, was the 19th oral surgeon in Nevada! During his career, Stephen has had to deal with more trauma than most oral surgeons ever will, as he was one of the surgeons on call after the 2017 Las Vegas shooting. In this episode , you’ll hear about some of the physical and emotional trauma that he witnessed firsthand during the aftermath of that tragedy. Stephen is a firm...

Due to a gene abnormality, the World Health Organization labeled the odontogenic keratocyst as a tumor, but that is not the case. Today we are joined by an expert on the subject, Dr. Robert Marx, to discuss the nuances of diagnosing and treating odontogenic keratocysts. Dr. Marx is the Chief of oral maxillofacial surgery at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine and has a wealth of expe...

Until you show your patients that you care, it doesn’t matter to them how much you know; that is one of the biggest lessons that Dr. Dan Tran learned through his experience of being diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer during his second-year residency. Another is that we never know how much time we have left on earth and it’s so important that we make time for the things and people we love. Although...

 As oral surgeons, we spend a lot of our lives in positions that aren’t good for our bodies, and which can end up causing us a lot of pain. Your host, Grant Stucki, knows this all too well. Today’s episode is a lesson in what so many of us are doing wrong, and how we can start looking after ourselves better. Our guests today are Dr. Julie Chaves, an oral surgeon, and Chuck Turner, a personal train...

If you’re a young surgeon who has been taught to believe that starting a dental business is incredibly difficult, you are far from alone. Our guest today, Dr. Jeffrey Carter, is here to explain why this is not the case, and how his company makes it much easier for oral surgeons to become independent contractors. Jeffrey’s vision for OMS Logistics is to provide a platform where surgeons can network...

Owning and running your own oral surgery practice isn’t for everyone, but if you are able to handle the challenges that come along with it, it can be an extremely gratifying experience. After leaving the job he had working for someone else, Dr. Michael Goulston went out looking to buy a practice, and ended up deciding to start his own instead. Over the past six years he has acquired a huge amount...

If you are interested in learning how to make the most of your time as a dental professional, this is the episode for you! Dr. Aaron Liddell has managed to get to a point where almost all of his time is productively spent, and he has a team of people positioned around him to do the rest. Aaron explains how he ended up taking the road less traveled in terms of the dentistry fields that exist, and a...

We’re calling today’s episode the one-upper! Tuning in, you’ll hear Dr. Grant Stucki and Dr. Mike Hall share some of their best dental stories, partly for comedic relief but also to impart some important lessons about client communication, adequate sedation techniques, and careful employee selection, as well as what you can learn from your patients about different cultures and mindsets (and kinks)...

It takes a lot of hard work to become a doctor, but to be a doctor who has also found massive success in other careers is something else entirely. Dr. Robert Guyette is one of those people. Today he joins us to talk about his approach to life and how it led him to have fruitful careers not just in medicine but in real estate and professional basketball too! Before our guest got his MD he was Bob G...

Today on the show the dynamic gets reversed because this is a recording of Dr. Stucki being interviewed by the famous Dr. Howard Farran! Dr. Farran is arguably the titan of dental podcasting, as he is the host of the widely loved Dentistry Uncensored show, and he also wrote Uncomplicate Business which Dr. Stucki is a big fan of. Dr. Stucki originally reached out to Dr. Farran, asking him to be a g...

If an oral surgeon gets to the point where they cannot get a healing abutment off, or conversely, it keeps falling off, it can be a frustrating experience for all involved parties. So for this episode of Everyday Oral Surgery, we are exploring the things that can go wrong with healing abutments and what to do about them! We begin with the situation where a healing abutment has been screwed on too...

The full mouth extraction process can be a daunting and traumatic one for patients. However through the right care and communication, it can be managed in a healthy and safe way, and joining to talk about exactly how he does this, is Dr. Scott Weiskopf! Scott is an oral and maxillofacial surgeon, currently practicing in Memphis, and we get to hear all about the way he approaches his work in full m...

Dr. Bryan White has spent the past eight years as a traveling surgeon with Pacific Dental Services (PDS), and has accumulated a lot of knowledge along the way. He joins us on the show today to share his pearls of wisdom with regard to preparation, surrounding oneself with a great team, and transporting equipment. There are over 100 surgeons who are employed by PDS, and Bryan is one of the top prod...

Oral surgery residency is a time of growth for dental students and but also an opportunity for those students to shape the program itself. It is important for there to be a good fit between the student and the institution so that a mutually beneficial dynamic is created. Today on the show we invite Dr. Michael Miloro, Program Chairman at the University of Illinois at Chicago, to shed some light on...