Dentist in South Pacific?

[drruss]

A warm salt water rinse a few times a day and especially right before bed to clean the area works well too. That and your antibiotics will buy you a little time.

[JPA Cate]

The OP has two options: to seek dental help or not. To encourage him to take off without knowing how bad his present situation is, is to encourage him to a possibly life threatening activity.

I think he needs assessment by a professional... before deciding it's too scary to get the extraction done where he is.

It is the most conservative approach, but will see him leaving the area healthy, which should be his highest priority. All the talk about "how to do it" without knowing what the "it" actually is, seems unwise to me, especially since we're lay people, and he needs a dental professional.

Ann

[grahamb]

Hi .....regarding your query in regard to Cairns.......very safe marina......and pile moorings are usually available...... also any and all work or parts should be easy to obtain as Cairns is the home port for a large fishing fleet and Barrier Reef charter boats.........as well as the last town of any size for next few thousand miles if heading to Darwin....good dentists.....expensive......would also agree to get it done really soon......

[NoTies]

Originally Posted by Tetepare

Papeete would be the closest with reasonably assurable decent care.

If you need a suggestion for a dentist in Papeete, Pago or Apia send me a PM and I'll ask the guys there.

I generally wouldn't try a dentist in Tonga or Fiji. Probably same w/ Vanuatu.

Things have changed a lot, especially in Port Vila which has first rate dental care and surgery available for the last 4 years. Fiji also has some very good dentists and orthodontists.

[theway]

First thanks for all the help.

As an update, The pain was leaving and left completely soon after my last post. My guess is that it was growing in a little, similar to the top one I had which would bug me once every two months or so, but not in three years. I have been putting off any extractions for years because some dentist say they're fine, then the next will say remove them, then again they're fine. If it was a consistent direction from good to bad I'd probably have done it by now, but back and forth isn't very convincing. One of the perks of traveling a lot is my dental work is done by different people, with different perspectives, so it's like having 3rd and 4th... opinions. But who knows, maybe in the end they'll be fine, or maybe it would have been better to listen to the folks that said yank'um.

I don't have any lengthy passage until after Australia so I'll see what happens, but nice to hear about Fiji and Vila.

[NoTies]

I'm in the north of Vanuatu and had a small health scare recently. The "upmarket" medical centre in town is staffed by very good volunteers but there is a lack of continuity of care for something that is likely to be a chronic condition due to the limited time the volunteers are here. So, I run everything by my very good cruising friend and highly experienced doctor (especially in remote locations). I'm an engineer and know full well that there are many right ways to do things but I didn't want to be chopping and changing medications and regimes as new doctors came along so I basically use them to monitor my condition and take treatment advice from my friend (with the medical centre's blessing). A good upside is that my doc friend knows I drink too much as he is often drinking too much with me so he factors this in and comes up with ways to mitigate the abuse I am subjecting my body to. LOL.

[chouliha]

Originally Posted by donradcliffe

The French have terrible dental care compared to the USA, so I would try American Samoa. In Tonga or Fiji, you may not get a new needle for the anesthetic.

There are a number of excellent dentists and dental surgeons in Papeete. Have listed those we have heard about and used in the Papeete cruiser guide.

www.tahiticruisersguide.com

Pago is another choice at LBJ medical clinic

Just curious if you checked at the clinic in Bora for when the dentist will be visiting?

Good luck

Chuck
Jacaranda
Huahine

[double u]

...irrelevant though this is by now I still want to tell this anecdote from Suva in 84:
dentist hands my lady a mirror so she can admire his handywork - & on the backside of the mirror sits ---a huge cockroach...