Being what I would like to describe as a fairly laid back person, there is little that I ever find genuinely troublesome.

Maybe it is as the product of a large, hectic family with a long history of chaos that I have learnt to face some of the storms of life or maybe it’s just that I don’t have enough to worry about.

I suspect the former holds more truth. I’m sure there are times when it would probably be beneficial to me to perhaps elicit a small amount of worry but there is a rarely a situation that is ever in any way made easier simply by worrying. I don’t wish to sound like a hard-hearted witch, it’s just that it seems so utterly pointless to spend time fretting over things. I’m more of a solution kind of girl.

Doing a job which involves spending a significant proportion of my working day dealing with worry in others, I’ve had plenty of experience with how it affects people.

Almost daily, I meet new patients to the practice whose first words are to tell me how worried they are and the effect this can have is quite remarkable. I’d have to be pretty stupid to not empathise with the cause of this emotion; no one likes the idea of discomfort, potential bad news and least of all the cost of dentistry.

Making people feel at ease is not a skill that we get taught at university and not every dentist, doctor or person involved with anxious people has this ability.

Everyone has some experience of the health professional who appears to have been trained by robots.

I wouldn’t be so egotistical to assume a superior bedside manner, and it’s often the hardest part about being a dentist.

Without a shadow of a doubt there will have been plenty of people over the years whom I have had little appeal for.

Just as in life, there are as many different personality types in people visiting the dentist as there are in us dentists . There are those who love to chat and are happy to discuss the details of their lives, those that want to get in and out of the chair a fast as possible with minimal interaction.

There are those that are inherently suspicious, many that are nervous and some are a little bit rude.

One of the arts of dentistry is to work out who falls into which camp.

I know I won’t appeal to everyone and the thick skin that I’ve developed over the years helps me to deal with that.

I have my favourites whose names make feel happy when I see them on a list of daily patients, as well as some who have the opposite effect. Part of being professional is ensuring people can’t tell the difference.

I’ve often likened dentistry to hairdressing. Perhaps not such an obvious similarity but stay with me and I’ll explain.

When I visit the hairdresser at WIGG in Henley, I assume a level of skill in her.

I see her regularly and I look forward to our chance to catch up with each other’s lives. I don’t want her to talk to me so much that she stops concentrating on what she’s doing but equally I don’t want to sit in silence.

It’s as much her personality, as her skills at hairdressing that keep me coming back. Fair enough, my hair may not be the most glowing recommendation for her but that’s my fault, not hers.

She remembers things about our conversations and seems as genuinely interested in me as I am in her, which quite frankly is a miracle. Perhaps I could harness this similarity and offer a cut and blow dry with every six-monthly check.

There are few situations that give the majority of us dentists as much satisfaction as making people feel comfortable. As trite as it sounds, stopping anyone worrying about dentistry is what makes it all worthwhile.