Meeting with Dr. Cavallini

Monday February 25 continued....it has been a long day!


 Finally, they called for Bakty again, and we were off to have our consultation with Dr. Cavallini.
Bakty has given me permission to let y'all know this; he was pretty scared about the whole implant thing!  The whole idea of having something screwed into your jaw is pretty intimidating, not to mention he was anticipating major pain from the whole procedure.  That is another reason (other than the tanning thing ;-) ) that I came along, spousal support! 

I borrowed these photos from Dr. Cavallini's website- It seems my camera somehow lost my photos of these.

3D X-ray

Garden Area Near Front Waiting Room

   Dr. Cavalllini's office is to the right of the waiting room at the front of the office. He has a big comfortable office filled with books, photos, trinkets and his degrees posted on the wall.  He is very pleasant and personable, I can't imagine anyone not liking him.  He loves to tell jokes!  He didn't start our conversation with "well here is what we are going to do", he took his time and got to know us a little first.  He asked us where we were from, and where Bakty was from originally.  He looked at me and ascertained that I had a bit of English decent in me and insisted I speak with a British accent, I do Southern so much better and easier. He wanted to put us at ease and get to know us better.  He has clients come to him from all over the world, and being as Bakty is originally from Indonesia, we had to discuss languages. Dr. Cavallini makes a point to learn as many phrases from all different languages that he can.  He keeps a little book with the most popular phrases in it and we discussed quite a few of them.  He gave us a lesson in Turkish, Thai, Polish, Arabic & Italian.  After discussing languages and where we had traveled in the world and if this was our first time to Costa Rica, he then asked Bakty what he was wanting to have done with his teeth.  We explained what we thought needed to be done as he pulled the x-rays, that they had taken earlier that day, up on the large computer screen on his desk.  We had said originally we thought Bakty needed 4 implants, but he said there was no need for 4 and that 3 would do.  Bakty was actually only missing 2 upper back molars, but thought he was missing 3.  One more of  Bakty's other teeth needed to be extracted before the implant could be done on it, this was the tooth that prompted us to leave for Costa Rica as quickly as we did.  Bakty was ready for it to be out so the pain would go away.  We asked if that tooth could be taken care of first and Dr. Cavallini said that it could. 

  Bakty's next question was "So, what is the process going to be tomorrow?".  In a most serious expression, Dr. Cavallini explained that, " First we are going to call the funeral home, and then we are going to pick you out a nice casket, we'll be sure you have a nice funeral, then we are going to make sure we find your wife a good husband."  I was laughing, Bakty, not so much. He confessed to me later that he wasn't sure just how to take that statement, it had him a bit unsettled.  I understood Dr. Cavallini's personality and the humor, but Bakty was already nervous and apprehensive about the whole ordeal and didn't find it quite as amusing as I did.  Bakty eventually overcame the apprehension of the whole ordeal.   

  Dr. Cavallini explained further about the implant procedure and the fact that due to the infection in the lower tooth, that would be extracted, it would be necessary to do a bone graft as well.  Also because of the area of infection, the size of the implant would be pretty large. He asked if we had any further questions, and the only one at that point was, what time did we come back to get started.  We didn't need to know what this was going to cost, as we had already received an email estimate of charges for the procedures before we had left home.  $2,000 was our approximate total for this time around.  3 implants and a bone graft for less than the cost of 1 implant in the U.S. !  We would have to return to Costa Rica again, anytime after 3-4 months to have permanent crowns put on the implants.

  I have to interject here for a moment and say that both Bakty and I felt very good about the amount of time that Dr. Cavallini spent with us.  There hasn't been any physician, dental or otherwise who has ever taken so much time to get to know us and try to put us at ease before a procedure.  We weren't the only people who felt this way about Dr. Cavallini, and Dr. Marcos (his son), as well as the rest of the staff.  They all want to make you feel as comfortable and at ease as possible. We heard the same sentiment over and over again from the people we met.  Rest assured it is all well worth the wait!

  He said Bakty would need some pain medicine and antibiotics and he then scribbled out his prescription and walked us out to the back of the office to the pharmacy.  We paid for the prescriptions and headed back to the front office. We then went to schedule with Diana. She looked at her schedule book and told us to be back in the office by 11:00am the next morning (Tuesday).  It is now about 7:15pm, dark and still a bit rainy.  We asked Diana to call for a cab, we figured we would tackle the walking thing tomorrow, after all we weren't' really sure how to get to our hotel.  We met the taxi within a few minutes outside the office and asked for Hotel Cristina, although I believe Diana had already given him this information.  He didn't talk much and we were tired anyway, it had been a long day! I was watching the meter in the cab to see how much the ride was going to cost us.  The meter didn't move for quite sometime and then it quickly started to rack up the colones.  Traffic was bad and the closer we got to the hotel the worse it seemed to get.  We were almost to the hotel at the intersection of Pan American Highway #1 and Boulevarde de Rohrmoser when traffic was stopped in all 4 directions.  There were 2 large buses that seemed to have ever so slightly collided with one another and behind one of them was another bus, all in the middle of the intersection.  We needed to go straight which meant that we would have to squeeze through the 5 feet of space that was between the latter 2 buses.  Everyone else was doing it, and so did our driver.  Finally on the other side of the traffic jam we quickly made it to the hotel.  The taxi ride came to a total of 2,000 colones or $4 U.S., which the driver gladly accepted.

  Upon arriving back at the hotel we stopped at the front desk to get our bags and head to our room.  Remember our room wasn't quite ready when we first arrived.  It was just around the corner to the right.  Our room layout was very nice, just flip the kitchen and sitting room and that is what we had.  We were starving by now and threw our bags into the room and secured the necessary items in the safe and off to the Chinese restaurant, Flor de Loto, down the street from the hotel.  We had been told it was good, we would soon determine if that was so.

  It was the only close, within walking distance, restaurant open, except for the Italian one in the hotel, but we didn't want Italian.  We entered in and seated ourselves near several other tables of people.  We ordered 2 bottled waters, tofu soup, fried rice, mango chicken.  We were not very impressed with it at all, where was the mango with the chicken?  All we got was a sauce and fried chicken strips, no veggies, nothing.  The fried rice was equally absent of veggies. The soup was okay, not very flavorful.  We asked for a to-go box, there was at least enough portions to have left overs for the next day.  We paid our $32 check and left, vowing we would not return.  The next morning confirmed that for me...
  
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