Now, what does this mean for dentistry? I think it's important to comprehensively treatment plan for all of our patients. I think it's important to comprehensively treatment plan where we're going to go in our own lives. Most people don't take the time to do that.

In dental school, we were given a certain protocol to follow. Some of us were treating comprehensively; some of us just learned procedures. And as you know, if you've listened to me before, I think it's very important that we not be procedure-oriented, but more comprehensive-oriented.

What does that mean? All patients receive a comprehensive examination, and they all receive a diagnosis. And there can be only one true diagnosis. There should really be one true comprehensive examination where we look at periodontics, caries, the bite, aesthetics, ortho, et cetera, as well as cancer exams. So it's important that we treat comprehensively and then give the patient a series of options. That is basically our framework for where we're going to end up.

Most of us don't do that. We're influenced by patients. And as I've said before, do you sometimes provide the treatment that the patient wants, even though it's not the right treatment? Would you do the same treatment?

If a patient comes in and says, "Just treat this one tooth, but ignore the periodontal disease that's in my mouth," or, "Just treat this one tooth, and I don't care about the aesthetics over here or my bite," you know that by treating that one tooth, the patient's going to be worse off in the future.

Do the right thing because it is the right thing and continue to be a gift to your patients. Have a great day, everybody, and thank you for listening.