Becoming a dentist: Is it worth it?

Many of the viewers here at DentalDAT are students who are thinking about becoming a dentist, just getting started on the path to becoming a dentist, applying to dental school,  or dental students. Throughout this entire process, where ever they might be, the question that is in the back of their minds remains "Is it worth it to become a dentist?".

Becoming a dentist is what I've wanted to do since I could remember. I never doubted my desire to become a dentist but throughout the process I did ask myself if it is worth the time and effort. I never was able to come up with a good answer. Many dentists that I spoke with "liked" their job and didn't regret their decision to become a dentist. I've occasionally come across a dentist who wished they would have chosen a different career but that was few and far between.

In all truthfulness the answer to this question is going to come down to your definition of "worth". Dentist graduating 20 years ago could come out of school with $60k of debt and get it paid down in a reasonable amount of time and begin saving. Now days you are looking at between $200k to $550k on top of your college loans. At a 7.1% interest rate this begins growing rapidly.  Payments ranging from about $1k to $3k+ a month can be daunting and overwhelming for some.

So what does "worth it" mean? To me "worth it" means being involved in a profession that has prestige and that allows for me to impact the lives of other. Every day I work with patients who gain functionality or increase esteem because of the dental work performed. Whether it is an esthetic case of anterior crowns, delivering a set of dentures or extracting a tooth that has been hurting. I am continually studying the art of dentistry so that the results my patients receive are high quality. Dentistry allows for me to be involved in a profession that encourages a lifetime of learning and continual practice to improve skills.

Despite the satisfaction resulting from patient care, "worth it" also means being able to provide a comfortable life style for my family. Financial rewards (AKA the paycheck) and of course time are both very important. Having only been out of school for just under a year this aspect will be something that continues to change througout my career. However, even at this very early stage my family lives comfortably. I am able to spend time with my wife and kids. I am able to treat them to experiences that take many households years to obtain. In addition, I am able to give to those in need without feeling like I am strapped for cash. Despite the large monthly loan payments I am happy with the financial rewards that my carear offers.

Is it "worth it" to become a dentist? My short answer is, absolutely. Is it without sacrifice or compromise? No. If you want to get rich quick this is not the profession for you. It is going to take at least 8 busy years and a lot of debt to get to the point of earning a paycheck. However, if you want a solid and relatively stable career this just might all be "worth it". 

Doing well on the PAT section of the DAT

For many of us the PAT section of the DAT can be very intimidating. Within the PAT there are several challenges. Remember, this section is new to everyone taking the DAT! There will be some of you who are naturals but the majority will struggle at first. Just like a video game the more you play the better you get!

There are 5 sections within the PAT:

a) Key Hole

b) Hole Punch

c) Top/Front/End

d) Cube counting

e) Pattern Folding

It will be essential that you become efficient in all of these areas if you want to do well. The following are steps that will help you to study the PAT section.

1) Be familiar with ALL the rules for each sections. Some times you may get one correct but for the wrong reasoning. To eliminate this know the rules. There are a few good resources for the rules including but not limited to Kaplan Blue Book, Studentdoctor.net (use search feature), The Gold Standard, and Crack DAT PAT. 

2) Once you've learned the rules you can practice, practice, practice. In general, Kaplan's resources are the easiest for this section, so you may want to start out with these. Just do a few at a time until you get the hang of them. 

3) With a good foundation, you can now begin testing yourself! I would suggest starting out with Crack DAT PAT because they offer a large number of tests. I would save the Top Score Pro and DAT Achiever tests for when you do full length practice tests (meaning all the sections together just like you would on the real DAT). Crack DAT PAT has 10 tests total but you can also randomize the tests. (Take a look at my DAT Breakdown in order to see how my real scores compared with my practice scores.).

4) Start by completing a single Crack DAT PAT test or test from another source. Taking a full PAT test will allow you to find your weaknesses. 

5) After finding your weakness go back and look at your score breakdown. What type of questions did you get incorrect? Once you identify your weakness go back and practice, practice, practice. Do a lot of the same type of problems over and over again. Do the same thing for any other section that you struggled with.

6) Now you can move on to PAT test number two. Repeat step 5 for this test. This process will continue all the way until test number ten. Don't try and knock these out in a couple of days. Give yourself some time between tests. Between tests is when you should be doing practice problems and reviewing rules on sections that you did not accelerate at.

7) It is going to be important that you take full length practice tests such as those sold by Top Score Pro or DAT Achiever. If you struggle with this section during the full length test do step 5 for each of those tests also. 

8) If you complete all of Top Score Pro, DAT Achiever, The Gold Standard and Crack DAT PAT and you still do not feel comfortable then I would suggest taking randomized Crack DAT PAT. However, this should not happen if you took your time learning the rules and analyzing the problems you get wrong on each test!

When I receive an e-mail regarding the PAT test it typically has to do with the angle ranking section. This section can be very deceiving and can impact your score dramatically. Some sources like Kaplan make this section way too easy and may instill a false sense of confidence. Crack DAT PAT is much closer to the real DAT by way of difficulty for the angle ranking. 

This section takes a lot of practice. I came up with a proprietary software that is meant to assist pre-dental students in mastering this section of the DAT. The first test begins with angles differing by 6 degrees. The second test has the angles differing by 5 degrees, while the third test has the angles differing by 4 degrees. The final test all of the angles differ by 3 degrees. This allows for you to begin to train your eye systematically in order to differentiate between the small difference in angles.

The software is free! Just enter your e-mail into the below form and I will give you access to the software.

Software Preview:

The Gold Standard DAT Review

  

 The Gold Standard provides a comprehensive resource for students studying for the Dental Admissions Test (DAT). Many of the viewers here at DentalDAT have expressed an desire for a complete review of this resource. The review includes but is not limited to the physical quality of the book, completeness of the material, quality of explanations, and quiz questions.

Physical Quality = A+

When I studied for the DAT I was exposed to several different books including Kaplan, Barrons, Cliff Notes, and DAT Destroyer. None of the materials that I used rivaled the physical quality of The Gold Standard. The Gold Standard consists of four complete books. These books are housed in a very sturdy sheath that adds protections during storage. Although not a hard back, the cover of each individual book is a very thick laminate adds for greater protection while remaining flexible and easy to use. Lastly, each of the books are printed on a heavy weighted gloss paper like that of a quality text book. Each page is printed in full color which adds dimension and helps with understanding pictures and diagrams. You will not find another resource for the DAT that is better quality than The Gold Standard!

The PAT = B+

Overall, a great resource for the PAT section plus much more. Although this book has very good explanations for each portion of the PAT , this book earned a B+ due to the lack of practice problems. In order, to be able to exclusively use this book for the PAT section many more practice problems would need to be included. None the less, a great resource for the PAT!

 The Gold Standard PAT includes much much more than just information on the PAT. This book begins with a brief section on "Dental School Admissions". Included is everything from how to improve your academic standing to the dental school interview. If you already have a solid handle on studying and you are doing well in school the most helpful part of this section will be the dental school interview. This has eight fantastic pages on how to prepare for your interview starting with a solid overview and ending with a couple of pages of strategies for answering questions. Overall the section on dental school admissions will be helpful for those who consider themselves a newbie to the dental school admissions process.

The second section in this book is called "Understanding the DAT". No surprises here! This book does a great job of giving an overview of the format of the DAT including a time breakdown of each section and the number of questions for the the given time. There are some very good study tips included in this section. However, there is no substitute for the ADA DAT Guide.

The third section is the text for the PAT section. This section does a great job of utilizing the color pages to explain each section of the PAT. If you have no idea how to go about solving any of the PAT sections then this is the resource you need. It is very important that you know how to solve each type of questions. However, it is just as important that you practice, practice, practice. Unfortunately, there are only 15 questions per section in the PAT. This is not nearly enough questions to become proficient in solving these types of questions. I would still highly recommend doing several full length practice tests. If you are still not getting the hang of this section I would supplement with Crack the PAT which provides more than enough practice tests for the PAT section.

The final section in this book is a full length practice test. The test appears to have very good quality questions with each answer having an explanation and a page reference for further studying. Having been over 5 years since I took the DAT exam I cannot accurately judge the difficulty or relevance of the questions. At the very least, the more questions you do the better prepared you will be for your exam.

Quantitative Reasoning and Reading Comprehension = B+

The math section is all about understanding how to solve the problems and then practice practice practice. The Gold Standard quantitative reasoning section does a great job at breaking down everything from simple multiplication to your algebraic equations to your more difficult trigonometry problems. This makes a great resource that includes a solid foundation for the math section. Once again, I felt like the book it self was lack in practice questions. There seemed to be about 10 questions at the end of each subsection in this portion of the book. You will want to have additional study resources that allow you to practice what you learned. After all, the quantitative reasoning section is all about practice.

Also included in the same book is the reading comprehension section. I feel like this resource has the potential to really help those who are either struggling to do well or want to learn some more efficient techniques to do even better on the reading section. When I studied for the DAT I searched forums and other resources to find a variety of techniques for improving on the reading section. This book includes just about everything I was able to find and more. In addition, it breaks down the individual types of questions and shows you how to go about answering each type of question. Overall, this is one of the better resources that I have seen available for the DAT.

General and Organic Chemistry = A

I am not going to go into too much detail with this one. If you have forgotten some of your general chemistry then this book is for you. This simplified text book provides great information on the basics of general chemistry with a little bit more in depth explanation when compared to some of the other available DAT specific resources. If you feel like you need to relearn any part of gen chem but you do not want to go through an entire textbook to do it then I would definitely give this a chance. As with the other books you may want to supplement this book with a lot more practice questions (By the way, the questions they do provide have very good explanations making it easier to learn from the practice questions). Resources like the ACS Gen Chemistry would be a great supplement.

The organic chemistry section of this book had reaction after reaction. This book appears to be well organized and provides very concise explanations for numerous organic chemistry reactions. It has been some time since I have done organic chemistry but this book brought back to memory a lot of reactions that I had learned in the past. With that said, I cannot say whether this book provides all the necessary reactions to score a 30 in this section as it has been a while since I took the DAT. I can say that it will lay a solid foundation for your DAT preparations. Once again try supplementing this with more practice problems from the ACS Organic Chemistry books or other resources.

Biology = A

Last but definitely not least is the DAT Biology section. This book is 380+ pages just for the biology section. Included are some great explanations, colored pictures, charts, and diagrams. The biology section of the DAT requires a broad knowledge of all topics. This book breaks down each of the subtopics provided by the ADA DAT Guide. Everything from microbiology, to biology of the different systems, to genetics, to evolution to ecology... And the list goes on. I know many of you do not want to study unnecessary topics or information. This book provides solid information without going overboard. I think this book is a definate winner for The Gold Standard DAT books.

Overall, had I realized the potential of a resource such as this I probably would have spent the $199 on this resource. Yes, you can piece together a bunch of resources which worked for me and many others but this is a simple way of getting everything you need from one source. Also, don't forget to go to www.dat-prep.com where they have online resources, videos, and practice test also available for sale. And... A little plug for the Top Score practice tests. These I did use and would highly recommend the investment. By far the best overall practice tests you can get for the DAT. Very close to the real deal. Checkout some of my other posts if you want details on what I thought about the Top Score practice tests.

Hope this helps some of you make a decision. If you have any questions or want to provide feedback from your own experience please comment below!