Some people are so afraid of going to the dentist that they don’t want to be treated even if they are in pain. Specialists can achieve amazing results with medical hypnosis. Nina Himmer

Some patients are not forgotten. In the case of Albrecht Schmierer, it is a truck driver who has not gone to the dentist for 50 years. When he did come to Schmierer’s practice in Stuttgart at the insistence of his daughter, he only had two loose teeth left in his mouth. “His fear was so great that he preferred to pull his own teeth rather than go to the doctor,” says the dentist. An extreme case, sure. But an isolated case?