A procedure involving music and noise has been effective in suppressing pain in 5000 dental operations. The music promotes relaxation, and the noise (the main agent) directly suppresses pain. The dental procedure and results are described, and an explanatory hypothesis is suggested.

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Intense auditory stimuli (combinations of “noise and music”) are being used to some extent in dentistry and medicine for their analgesic effects. Maximum-exposure durations and intensities of noise and music are specified to avoid any undue amount of auditory fatigue. These specifications are based upon previous damage-risk criteria and research data appearing in the literature on this subject and upon the findings of a series of experiments in which the hearing of subjects was tested before and after exposure to noise and music. The results of these new experiments are compared with the calculations made with formulas developed by Ward, Glorig, and Sklar for predicting the auditory fatigue from exposure to noise. The predicted and obtained results are in very close agreement.