"A Good Dentist Can't Sleep Peacefully If Makes Any Mistake During the Treatment": Dr. Sandesh Mayekar

“Father of Modern Dentistry in India”

Dr. Sandesh Mayekar from Mumbai is known as "Father of Modern Dentistry in India". Not only this, he is a well-known personality among the Bollywood fame, Designers, successful Industrialists and many others are in the list. During the communication process, many questions were asked.

First and foremost we would greet Dr. Sandesh Mayekar on the occasion of “National Dentist Day” which falls on March 6.

• During the interaction process, it was questioned, Did you always want to be a Dentist? And how did you end up becoming a Celebrity Dentist? And how did you get into this industry? 

Replying to it Dr. Sandesh said he became a Dentist and calls it an accident.  He said, "In 1971, when I lost my father, both my elder brothers were in IIT because they were supposed to be intelligent and according to my family members, I was an average but a smart student.

I got good marks in my SSC exam and my family thought I should become a Doctor as there was no doctor in the Mayekar family. So after my Inter-Science, I applied for Medicine, Dentistry, Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Unani, OT, PT. Fortunately, I got Dentistry that time. So I took what I got.

I always go with the flow, that’s my nature, to never say No! But I had one philosophy from the beginning that whatever I do, I try to be on the top, be No. 1 in that field. I thought even if I become a Boot Polishwala, I should be No. 1 in it. Coolie No. 1, Jodi No. 1, came later on in movies.

I always thought that I should be in the Top 10, not to compare with other fields. So that was my focus in Dentistry from Day 1. I was an average student in College but was doing well enough."

Adding more, He said “I was doing a lot of social work, camps, etc. So, I became known in my college. After College, I became Secretary of the Indian Dental Association, Mumbai. Then I became President of IDA and then subsequently I was appointed as the National level first Vice-President and Editor of Journal of IDA.

So, from the 1970s until 1991, I was known in the Dental profession amongst the Dental community as I was doing a lot of work for Dental Association. The change took place in public at large as well as among Dentists that made me more famous from this level, was on 16th January 1980, when my programme on Aesthetic and Cosmetic Dentistry was telecasted on Door Darshan, just before Chhayageet, it was on Tuesday afternoon and the whole country came to know about Aesthetic and Cosmetic Dentistry, that’s how I introduced this specialty in our country.

I further learned Aesthetic and Cosmetic Dentistry from the United States of America in 1988. I became famous not only with Dentists but a lot of people in the country from Kashmir to Kanyakumari started coming to me because it was something different in the field of Dentistry.

I wanted to do something different all the time but not to compete with others. I had done post-graduation in Oral Pathology and research in Oral Cancer and wanted to go to the USA after my studies but could not go then.

So, I decided to start my private dental practice. I used to work with my mentor Dr. Bhansali and learned from him that the sky's the limit in Dentistry. Initially I thought that I would have a small practice but my perspective changed when I saw Dr. Bhansali working on famous personalities, I still remember Mr. Dhirubhai Ambani used to come to him for dental treatment. Many other celebrities also used to come to him.

One of the celebrities who was coming to him was Lata didi (Late Lata Mangeshkar). Forty years back, in 1980, I thought Didi should come to me for dental treatment some-day. Thus, I got introduced to celebrities through Dr. Bhansali.

I was known in the dental field and subsequently, the Indian public knew me because of my Door Darshan programme where we showcased live cosmetic dentistry cases and those patients came to Door Darshan studio and shared their experience of what difference that treatment had made. So, this was how I started becoming famous as a Dentist. 

Also, I was passionate about sharing knowledge with the fellow dentists. I was the one who introduced Continuing dental education in the country by getting the best people from the world to India like Dr. Gordon Christensen (God of Dentistry in the USA). I introduced the course of NYU University in India in 1992. This made me well-known among dental colleagues throughout the country.

Later, I met Late Mr. Pradeep Guha, from Times of India, who was in charge of Femina and FilmFare at that time and explained to him about designing beautiful smiles for the beauty pageants.

He introduced me to Miss India in 1993 and gave me the first model to treat.  I became known from the celebrity point of view when I treated Miss Manpreet Kaur Brar who won the Miss India crown in 1995 and was the first runner-up at the 1995 Miss Universe pageant.

This gave me an elite status. Bombay Times, Page 3 was quite popular and I used to have my articles on it. There was an article stating me as “the man behind Manpreet Brar's smile”. 

Knowing about Who are the renowned personalities to whom Dr. Sandesh has provided his treatment! Replying to it he says Miss India beauty pageants were the first ones to get introduced to Aesthetic and Cosmetic Dentistry.

This was followed by Bollywood celebrities such as Shah Rukh Khan, Urmila Matondkar, Vidya Balan, Sushmita Sen, Kareena Kapoor, Karisma Kapoor, Saif Ali Khan, Jacqueline Fernandes, R. Madhavan, Rajkumar Rao, Anil Kapoor, Tushar Kapoor with his father, Hrithik Roshan, Karan Johar, Ritesh Deshmukh, Babita, Waheeda Rehman, Baby Nanda, Asha Parikh, Dilip Kumar and above all Lata didi (late Lata Mangeshkar).

Also, famous designers such as Manish Malhotra, Anna Singh, Hemant Trivedi, Narendra Kumar, Shabina Khan and many successful industrialists and lot more are in the list.

It was questioned about the New treatments in dental care that we should be aware of? 

He says that Everyone is aware of the issues of white and pink (that is of teeth and gums) such as cavities, crooked teeth, gum problems, Oral Cancer, etc. In the year 1990, I introduced Aesthetic and Cosmetic Dentistry in India and in the year 2008, I introduced TMD (Temporo Mandibular Disorders.)

I realised that the so-called spondylosis or so-called Migraine like headaches, for which patients are asked to take rest or take medicines, 95% of such problems are related to bite/jaw relation. That’s what I learned in 1999 from my own experience while pursuing my Masters in TMDs at Tufts University.

Today more than 80% of people have this problem as it's mostly stress-related. If you remove a single tooth and do not replace the missing tooth, it causes a headache. With these two introductions, in 2018, I got the title “Father of Modern Dentistry in India '', from the International Association for Dental Research (IADR), the biggest body in the world, and also the Indian Society for Dental Research. 

During the Indian Dental Association (IDA) conference in 1991, when I was the Secretary, we had organised a “Dental Implant” course to introduce Implants in India in a big way.

In the year 1987, I did my first course in Implant Dentistry. But I didn’t have money to do implants for my patients. I started doing Dental Implants from the year 2000 onwards.

The latest technology of CAD-CAM is also used in our practice.

We must be aware of the most common type of problem-related to teeth and asked Dr Mayekar which is the most frequent issue which he observes regularly? Also, which age group suffers most from dental issues? Any advice for them? Responding to this question he said, The most common type of problem-related to teeth is Dental caries (cavity) due to which teeth break down and another common problem is Gum disease.

These common problems are due to negligence. It may affect any age group, from children to adults to old people. Oral Cancer is not much prevalent in cities. Maximum cases of Oral Cancer are usually seen in either very low socio-economic or very high socio-economic strata of people, especially those consuming Paan masala or tobacco all the time. They use it as a means to kill hunger. Poor people don’t have food and rich people don’t have time to eat food.

My advice is very simple. Do not postpone your small dental issues. Because in Dentistry there is nothing called Self-Cure! It increases from a small cavity to a big cave (Elephanta cave) You may have to lose your tooth due to such a big cavity. You cannot take medicine to save your tooth. With Yoga and Pranayam, the cavity in the tooth would not get filled. The reason is very simple. All dental issues are biochemical. It's not only biology but also a biochemical issue and that is the reason it cannot get cured on its own. So you need to visit a dentist.  My advice to them is not to get afraid of Dentists and should go forward for a proper care. 

How do you feel about treatment for celebrities?  There is always an issue that many people have, when a celebrity comes as a patient, you feel ‘Oh, he/she is such a famous person’ and you start getting butterflies in your stomach. Initially, I also got it.

But luckily I had observed Dr. Bhansali treating celebrities in his clinic and what I learned after watching him is that the celebrity status of that person is outside my clinic. When they come to my clinic, they are human beings having dental problems.

So, I always concentrate on their problems rather than their personality. Their personality stands outside. I still remember when Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor were in my clinic, when I completed Saif’s work, I washed my hands, changed gloves, and called the next patient.

And that patient said ‘Doc, I am very happy you treated them in the same way as you treat me. I thought since they are celebrities, you would go to leave them outside your clinic till their car’. I said ‘No, No. For me, they are celebrities outside my clinic and not inside’.

The other day Sushmita Sen also asked me if you never get butterflies while treating celebrities. I said I used to get it. But whenever I have such a feeling, butterflies in my stomach, hands shaking, then I don’t treat that patient on the first day. I just talk to them, I diagnose but I don’t start the treatment.

I use my soft skills to manage the patient. I never got that when I was treating Lata Mangeshkar or Rajashree Birla. I feel very nice to treat them. The best part about treating celebrities is that they accept Me and my clinic. They could go anywhere in the world but they accept me, my clinic, and my treatment plan.

Knowing what Dr. Sandesh Mayekar loves the Most about his job? I believe that as no human face is the same, similarly no smile is the same. I love to design the smile which goes with the face. So every smile design is something different and it’s a creative job. It is an artistic job within the medical parameters.

I love to do that and while doing that I also want to keep the function so that they can chew and eat properly. A combination of these two I call it Functional Smile Design. We do both together and I love the creativity incorporated into the basics of dentistry.

Previously the dentist was only for pain factor related to teeth. Now it has changed to glamour, smile and function. This is what I love about my profession, to give happiness to the patient, not just change the smile but give confidence to the patient. We can see the confidence in the eyes.

A smile is a curvature. The patient who smiles 100%, their lips curve and if you combine both curvatures it passes through eyes and the eyes tell you whether the patient is happy and smiling. When a smile is less than 100%, lips are straight and when someone is upset, lips are inverted. So the eyes tell you whether one is happy or not. 

Dropping down a key point that one must be aware of the dental issues! According to Dr. Sandesh, Dentistry is different from Medicine (Allopathy, Ayurveda, Homeopathy, Unani). In medical, you go to the doctor when you have some problem or pain. In Dentistry, you should go before the problem so that you can prevent the problem. You can see your teeth so you can prevent the problem.

That’s the major difference between Medical and Dental. Explaining it he says, suppose if something happens to your eyes and you have to keep your eyes closed for a couple of days, you would be able to do everything except that you cannot see.  Now imagine you can do everything but you don’t have teeth in your mouth. your total general health would go for a toss.

Also, there is a correlation between gum infection and diseases like diabetes because bacteria may enter the blood circulation and affect your heart, kidney, liver, etc. So an infection in the mouth can affect your overall general health.

You get micronutrients like proteins, carbohydrates, etc, and micronutrients like minerals, vitamins, etc by digesting the food. If you don’t have teeth in your mouth, you don’t get proper nutrition. 

Friends, having all the teeth in your mouth is very very important for overall general health. To prevent disease, visit your dentist regularly. 

Are we following proper healthy schedules related to dental hygiene?  Have a look for How can we take good care of our teeth? Dr. Mayekar gave good advice which must be kept as a key point. He says everyone knows that they have to brush their teeth. What they don’t know is how not to brush your teeth. That I am going to tell you now.

•Brush twice in 24 hours: Once in the day, once at night. Night brushing is very important.

•Store your brush in the right way.

• Do not keep your toothbrush open.  It was found during covid that virus can transfer from one toothbrush to another, so do not keep toothbrushes of all family members together. Keep them separately, cap them and store them in a closet. If the capped toothbrush is left outside near the sink and others rinse their mouth in the same sink then aerosols can transmit to the toothbrush.

•Dip your toothbrush in antibacterial mouthwash- such as chlorhexidine, cap it and then keep it. So now the brush is antibacterial coated. 

•Floss your teeth: This cleanses the plaque from the interdental areas that are in between teeth.

•Use mouthwash 

•Cleaning your tongue: As any food particle present on the tongue gives bad breath

•Brushing technique: Never brush using horizontal strokes. Brush up and down. Hold the brush lightly

•Change your brush when it becomes like a flower or after 3 months. 

•Use the right toothbrush: Use a soft brush. Your dentist can advise which brush is best for your teeth.

It is a very hectic schedule to manage, it’s a nerve-wracking experience. How do you manage your schedule in terms of physical health and mental health? Usually, I wake up in the morning by 6:00 am or so.

I do morning walks for 45 minutes to one hour. I get the list of patients for my next day a day before. So, I prepare myself mentally and set a schedule for the day. If you enjoy work, you never have to work! I really enjoy my work. I look forward to the next day. On a Sunday, I look forward to Monday. My weekends are boring as I don’t have any other hobbies. My only hobby is Dentistry. 

What I do for my mental pleasure over weekends is that 40 out of 54 weekends I give lectures.

My philosophy to keep myself happy is by sharing my knowledge. At a time, I give lectures to 400-500 dental students. There was a webinar organised by the Dental Council of India for which there were more than 20,000 attendees. 

I never think of the past but always think ahead. That is how I keep my mental state in peace.

On National Dentist Day, my message:

For Dentists: I want to tell them to take no shortcuts. Always think of the benefit of the patient. So never cheat a patient. Cheating is not charging more or less. Cheating is telling something and doing something else.

Do the proper treatment for every patient thinking that every patient on the dental chair is your God and you will never make a mistake and you would be cautious about making any mistake. A good dentist is a person who does not get sleep if he has made any mistake in the treatment of any of his patients.

Mistakes can happen as we are human beings but always try to do a good job in the patient's mouth. Do not count how much money you are going to earn from that patient. Remember, you are always rich if your needs are less than your income. If you follow this philosophy, the sky's the limit, you will earn.

I can give my example that from staying in a chawl to 250 sq feet one room with a common bathroom to a bungalow in Bandra bandstand next to Shah Rukh Khan and Salman Khan is only on goodwill and not on money. Money is an accounting hobby but goodwill is everlasting.

For patients: I want to tell them not to postpone visit to Dentist and must keep proper dental hygiene and have a scheduled treatment. 

Lastly, can you share in brief about any challenging case witnessed so far? The most challenging case I had was of the person closest to me, who I came to know that she too loved me a lot after 6th Feb 2022, was the late Lata Mangeshkar.

I was introduced to her in 1980 when I was a student working with Dr. Bhansali. He was treating her lower front tooth at that time.  I said one day I will treat her. Although I didn’t have anything but still I said that. And she came down to me in 2002. 

Imagine treating her, one side is tongue and the other side cheeks. The tongue is so important for singing. Treating her was challenging but again I came back to my thought that she is a human and I have to treat her disease. The challenging part was to save her lower front tooth so that her singing career is not disturbed. We successfully saved her teeth till she was in this world. She had all her 32 teeth in her mouth.

The next challenge in treating her was during Covid times and after her first attack of pneumonia. I had to treat her in her house. I had a portable dental unit at her house. I treated her on a portable dental chair at her house for the initial few days and then she was in bed and I had to treat her in bed.

As a dentist, one can understand the challenge of treating a patient on the bed with a light which was on my head or sometimes the mobile light and bending my back when I had to treat her cavity on the upper left third molar or lower right third molar, which was a very difficult task. The challenge was not to hurt her.

Imagine if my hand moves and her tongue gets injured or her lips get injured. That was the challenge for me related to her mouth and doing it safely. Another challenge for me was to bend my back in such a way that I didn't get a catch.

Every time I treated her, I used to say to God: “O God, I am treating one of your colleagues, she is Saraswati, see that you don’t give me a backache.” And I have never got a backache. I might have gone 30-40 times in the last 3-4 years to her house. Every 15 days, she used to have a problem called geriatric cavities due to medicines and saliva being acidic, there were cavities at the gum level.

And her tongue was very sensitive, it immediately used to catch some roughness and she used to call and say: “Doctor, kadhi yaal?” (Doctor, when will you come?) I never said no to her and I used to treat her at any time of the day. So that was a challenging case for me treating Lata Mangeshkar not only at my clinic but also subsequently at her house and then on her bed.

Time Magazine India and team thanks Dr. Sandesh Mayekar for sharing his experience with us!