Child Patients

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Dental treatment
a child's perspective:

When a child is not asleep, dental treatment can be a traumatic and frightening experience. They are expected to sit and cooperate while some stranger pokes instruments deep into their mouth, which is contrary to basic animal instinct. (How many non-food items can you put in your pet's mouth?)

Most dental procedures involve getting numb (a "shot"), lots of water (that they're not supposed to swallow), and a loud drill with a sharp bur spinning at 3600 rpm. If they move their head, even slightly, while the drill is spinning they can ruin the tooth (leading to extraction), or cut their lip, tongue or cheek.

Is my child too young?

Healthy children as young as 2 years old are routinely sedated in the Dental Office. By age two, most medical conditions that impact the use of sedation have been discovered and most excessive drooling from teething has stopped.

Going to sleep for dental treatment

Intravenous Anesthesia enables:

• Safe and controlled dental treatment
• No memory of any treatment
• Multiple appointments can be condensed into one session
• No emotional trauma from going to the Dentist
• Hospital like conditions and monitoring

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Benefits of I. V. sedation/General anesthesia performed by the dental Anesthesiologist

A Dentist Anesthesiologist is a person who has completed Dental School and a Residency in Dental Anesthesia. There are currently 7 two-year programs in the country that offer this training. DA’s trained in the two year programs not only have experience in sedating patients during dental procedures, but also have performed in a the hospital operating room setting for various dental and medical procedures. Our two years of training allows us to perfect and finesse the Sedation techniques to allow the patient to safely receive dental treatment. We are trained to prevent, recognize and treat any and all possible complication.

Oral Sedation should be performed only by a trained Pediatric Dentist and involves the child drinking medication to help them become sedated and more cooperative. The dose of the oral medication is determined by the weight of the child and is administered 30 to 60 minutes prior to the procedure. The major drawback of oral sedation is that the response to any medications is relatively unpredictable. The medication may have no effect, provide mild sedation, deep sedation, or cause hyperactivity. Many times the child will still require the physical restraints of a papoose board to decrease the chance of movement and the risk of self injury. This can become a traumatic event for the child especially if more than one appointment is required. The Pediatric Dentist must monitor the progress of the sedation, breathing and heart rate and concurrently perform the dentistry.

I. V. Sedation/General Anesthesia is performed by a trained Dentist Anesthesiologist. With the medication’s dosage based on weight, the child is rendered cooperative with an initial shot to the arm or leg. This will relax the child to facilitate the placement of an Intra Venous line. Older children, if cooperative enough, may skip the shot in the arm or leg and have the I. V. line placed while on the parent’s lap. This eliminates the need for the medication named Ketamine (a strong but safe medication.) Medications are delivered through the I. V. line to the specific needs of the patient. The action of the medications is safe, immediate, accurate and predictable. No physical restrains are needed and there is no memory of the procedure by the child. Multiple procedures and multiple appointments can be completed in one session and the risk of traumatizing the child is eliminated. Newly developed medications tailored for the needs of dental procedures make I. V. Sedation/General Anesthesia safer than ever before. With an Anesthesiologist experienced with working with young children and dedicated solely to the anesthesia, anesthetic safety increases and the Pediatric Dentist is free to concentrate on the dental procedures. Efficiency increases and precision is achieved.

 

Monitoring and emergency equipment are always present for both types of procedures.

You are encouraged to ask questions. Please feel free.