Anxiety In A Dental And Maxillofacial Surgery Consulting Room: Does Previous Experience Matter?

Abstract

ObjectivesTo explore the associations between previous dental visits and dental anxiety among patients presenting at the dental and maxillofacial surgery clinic of Department of Dental and Maxillofacial Surgery, Federal Medical Centre, Birnin Kebbi, Nigeria.Materials and methodsThis study was a cross-sectional study conducted among 172 patients. Study instrument was a 9-item structured questionnaire, which obtained information about the participants regarding their: demographic profile; previous dental experience; and dental anxiety status in a dental and maxillofacial surgery consulting room. Data collected were analyzed using the SPSS Version 20 Software. Associations between variables were evaluated using Chi-square statistics using a p < 0.05 to determine the level of statistical significance.ResultsRoughly, six-tenth (57.6%) of the participants were males. The observed prevalence of dental anxiety among the participants was 47.7%. A history of pain experience during past dental treatment as well as a history of past dental visit were found to have statistically significant relationships with participants’ dental anxiety status (p-values < 0.05). However, the frequency of previous dental visits, a history of past dental treatment, and a history of use of intraoral injections in the course of past dental treatment were found to have no statistically significant relationship with participants’ status of dental anxiety (p-values > 0.05). Finally, the prevalence of dental anxiety among the groups of female folks with “a history of previous visit to a dentist” and “a history of pain experience in the past dental treatment” were found to be significantly higher than that observed among similar groups among the male folks (p-values < 0.05).ConclusionPrevious experience of pain plays a major role of influence over dental anxiety experience among patients. Hence, dental practitioners need to pay more attention towards dental anxiety management among patients, especially women.

Relationship between Children’s Lifestyle and Fear during Dental Visits: A Cross-Sectional Study

“…There was a big difference between age subgroups (only 61 children of 174 at 4-6 years old), so there is no proper statistical interpretation. However, in terms of patient gender, different studies have reported that fear is greater among female patients [35,37,39], although in our series no significant correlation was found between patient gender and fear of the dentist.…”

A study protocol for a single-centred randomized trial to investigate the effect of pre-treatment communication methods on dental anxiety among adult dental patients

“…In many parts of the world, including Nigeria, many people still report anxiety as a barrier to dental treatments. 10 – 16 Moreover, inadequate knowledge of dental procedures such as endodontics/root canal treatment (RCT), invariably affects the perception of individuals and the outcome of the treatment. 17 , 18 …”

“…In many parts of the world, including Nigeria, many people still report anxiety as a barrier to dental treatments. [10][11][12][13][14][15][16] Moreover, inadequate knowledge of dental procedures such as endodontics/root canal treatment (RCT), invariably affects the perception of individuals and the outcome of the treatment. 17,18 Endodontic treatment (RCT), conservative management of a complication arising from delay in accessing oral health care probably due to fear, is a fear factor by itself.…”