A $20 Adventure At The Cuenca Dentist's Office

I can't stop running my tongue over my teeth and smiling in the mirror today.

I've been to the dentist, and I couldn't be more pleased.

Recommended by a friend who had his entire mouth redone, Paula Dominguez has a simple office located just off Solano on Daniel Cordova Toral. It's behind the Colegio de Benigno Malo for those of you that are landmark driven. The building is a part of a longer strip of clinics and consultants offices. I made by appointment by phone - she speaks some English, but her husband is fluent, and so they work it out that way (cell: 097 - 868908).

When I arrived, she greeted me and asked after my teeth. I didn't really have any problem to report, other than having not been to the dentist's office in about a year. I'd already been planning to come to Ecuador, and I knew dental services were cheaper done here, so I'd been putting it off. In Ecuador as well they don't really have dental technicians, so even basic work is done here by the doctor.

She put me in the chair and then DANG, did my teeth ever get cleaned. She did an amazing job, checking over each tooth and cleaning them all twice, I swear. She even took the tooth polisher and cleaned my tongue, which tickled like crazy but was kind of fun, too.

Then she brought me a mirror so I could check out my smile and WOW. It looked like I'd had a whitening treatment, as she'd somehow managed to remove all evidence of the bazillionty trillion cups of black tea that I drink on a regular basis.

Total cost for an hour of high touch dental cleaning? $20. Totally worth it, as I couldn't be more pleased with my mouth!