How can you tell if a Dentist is excellent?

Is there a measure of dental excellence? .

Some people ask: does he hurt?; is he good with kids?; do his fillings fall out? Some people send in the kids and if they like the Dentist he is ok.
I make it mandatory for everyone in my office to be very concerned with being gentle, kids like me, and my fillings don’t fall out.
There’s another way to tell, though. In my office, a root canal after a filling that I do is necessary only 1% of the time, and only 3.8% of the time when a crown is needed*. (Crowns are done when a tooth is more severely damaged in the first place).

But the “1%” number is a rigorous test. This means that almost all decayed or damaged teeth needing fillings and crowns done in my office don’t need root canals. My staff informs me that in some other offices the percentage is as high as 10% to 50% of the time. If you had a choice, I’m sure you’d rather have just a filling or crown, rather than a filling and root canal. The question and measure of dental excellence is to ask: …’do your fillings and crowns turn into root canals?’ If they don’t turn into root canals, you are in the right place.
(*Data available on request)