DR EASON SOO
“ Dr Eason, can you share with us what sparked your interest to study Dentistry in the first place? ”
To be frank, I always wanted to become a dentist since when I was young. Although it is not that glamorous compared to other counterparts such as medical and surgery field, when you really like the field of study you’re choosing, you would have passion in it and strive for it. That’s why I chose to pursue my career in this field.
“ As dental students, we are exposed various specialties in Dentistry. What made Dr to choose Endodontics as field of speciality? “
There are a few specialities in Dentistry as Endodontics is one of them. To tell you the truth, I started to like Endodontics since I was a year 2 student here in UKM, working in the simulation lab. I found it to be quite challenging and interesting at the same time because you are not just dealing with the restorations or removal of the caries, but the entire tooth structure including the root canal system. Back then it was quite technically challenging for me because as a year 2 student, you don’t actually appreciate the pathology or science behind it. But after entering the clinical years, you will study more on it and get to know in depth regarding Endodontics. Seeing and treating patients to restore their oral health and daily oral function made me to be more satisfied with what I am doing, henceforth choosing Endodontics.
“ Being a specialist in Endodontics is not an easy thing to achieve. What were the challenges that Dr faced and if there were any, how did you overcame the challenges? “
There were many challenges, but put aside the financial part because my finances was taken cared by the university and JPA as I got scholarship from them to pursue my studies in Endodontics and Endodontology in University of Hong Kong. It takes about three and a half year of specialist training and masters as well as clinical courses. The most challenging part is perseverance as Endodontics is not an easy course. It requires a lot of knowledge and patience because you need to deal with patients and complex cases that comes along. In addition to that, you also have to conduct and submit research papers as well. Research and clinical work are both the core courses in postgraduate Endodontics study hence, you really need commitment and perseverance when it comes to studying Endodontics.
“ Dr, recently you published a journal entitled “Accuracy of single and parallax film and digital periapical radiographs in diagnosing apical periodontitis – a cadaver study”. So what sparked Dr’s interest to do this study? “
Before you can publish a journal, you have to do a study on it. It is quite an interesting study in the department, Centre of Restorative Dentistry. It is one of the department’s project and also a cadaver study. In the study, we compared and looked at the accuracy of firm periapical radiograph and the digital periapical radiograph. There is no distinct study in this field regarding the comparison of the radiographs as most of the classical studies only look at the two dimensional radiographs only and they can’t compare it to the gold standard, which is the cadaver. In this study, we took cadavers that are due for cremation, with ethical approval, and had the jaw resected. The resected jaw was studied and radiographs was taken with both firm and digital method. Both radiographs were compared to see if there’s any difference in terms of accuracy. Not only that, it was also compared with the histopathological baseline as well to confirm the presence of periapical lesion.
“ Lastly Dr, do you have any advice for our aspiring dental students? “
When coming to advice, there’s nothing much to say. Of course all of you dental students chose to be a dental student because you want to become a dentist or have an interest in pursuing studies in Dentistry. So my best advice is to study hard. Of course for clinical years there’s a lot of clinical cases to manage. Try to do a lot of patients as possible and expose yourself to various clinical cases. Other than that, the most important thing you need to have is a positive attitude and perseverance because Dentistry is not an easy course. There will be a lot of obstacles such as time will be one of them. You have to spend a lot of time in the clinic, in the lab, as well as time to do revision at night. Being a dental student is not easy but if you have a positive mind and keep doing your best, it should be reasonably easy to become a Dentist.