Sunday, October 08, 2006

Oral Health of Hyderabad

Last few days I was at Hyderabad, my fourth visit to Hyderabad. First time I came here I felt the warmth and cordiality of the city. The city has wide roads, always croweded, crowded buses, always busy streets near Charminar, noisy streets, old buildings, hot weather, and warmth of flowing life underneath its skin. That's what charmed me. Neither in Bangalore, Mumbai or Pune I have felt this feeling.
Two years have past since then. The city has changed a lot. More sophisticated, more posh, cost of living is rising with the IT boom. Roads are more crowded, more in-process flyovers are narrowing down the width of the streets. It is becoming more and more formal day by day. But one thing hasn't changed a bit - number of oral and dental clinics!
Just as you'll find a theatre in every hundred yards in Bangalore, you'll pass by three dental/oral clinics in every hundred yards in Hyderabad! It is really something awkward. Is the city has a real problem with oral health? Otherwise why will there be so many of dental clinics; and most of them seems to be well-to-do. Almost all of them are traditional old dentist's shop mostly run by Muslims with their signboards written in Urdu (as it seems to me).
Hyderabad's population is majorly of Muslim community. Meat is their regular diet. Mostly mutton/lamb sometimes beef or chicken or fish. They are masters in delicious non-vegeterian Moghlai dishes and especially Biryani (ummmm). Is this oily & spicy diet is more corrosive to the teeth than usual vegetarian and occasional non-vegetarian diet in other parts of India? Or is it that Hyderabad has a legacy of traditional dentistry coming down from generations? But then also, why among all of medical science, dentistry flourished here?
There is something teethy here!

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