How we relieve dental anxiety

Does the thought of seeing your local dental practitioner instil you with terror? These feelings are common among Australians who dread visiting the dentist for life-changing dental procedures such as High Dental Implants Melbourne.

These emotions and negative associations can be seriously harmful to your oral health, especially if your anxiety prevents you from seeing your local dentist regularly.

Our highly trained dentists, assistants and team of excellent staff at High Dental Implants Melbourne are well versed in managing your anxiety, allowing you to prioritise your teeth without your crippling fear holding you back.

Why do I feel this way?

Envisage this scenario: you need to replace your natural teeth with High Dental Implants Melbourne. While you understand that teeth implants will fix your smile and current dental health issue, you feel panicky, to the point where cancelling your appointment becomes the only viable solution for you.

This ingrained phobia could stem from a bad childhood experience where you’ve developed a fear of pain, injections, loss of control or invasion of personal space.

Fortunately, we can utilise treatments called conscious sedation that induce feelings of deep relaxation while attending to your smile that urgently needs our medical attention.

How can conscious sedation help me?

Anxiety might arise from the thought of being knocked out for dental treatment. By undergoing conscious sedation, you’ll remain awake but in a deep state of relaxation during a procedure like High Dental Implants Melbourne.

There are two types you can choose from:

• IV Sedation where you’ll be injected with a sedative drug
• Inhalation sedation where a mask is placed over your nose and mouth. You’ll breathe in nitrous oxide and oxygen, a gas mixture that prompts a sense of calmness. This form of sedation is suitable for individuals who take issue with needles.

Please note that you’ll feel drowsy and shouldn’t operate heavy machinery post-treatment. Ask a friend or a family member to drive you home.

What are some alternatives to conscious sedation?

Conscious sedation isn’t for everybody. Fortunately, we also use simple methods to calm your nerves. These include

• Creating a warm and friendly atmosphere that differs from a cold and clinical medical centre.
• Divulging details of the treatment to our patients. Fear often originates from a fear of the unknown or losing control. By informing you about the procedure, you’ll know what’s about to happen and may feel more prepared.
• We go at a pace most comfortable to you.
• Short, frequent breaks may be taken.
• The treatment can be stopped immediately using non-verbal cues.

Apart from incorporating these behaviours into our treatments, we also practise patience because we’re empathetic and understand that these procedures might be traumatic.

What can you do to keep calm?

Finding a distraction might help in eradicating or eliminating those butterflies in your stomach.

Listening to music with headphones helps to drown out the droning of our machines.

Ceiling mounted TVs can help divert your attention from the procedure.

Just breathe – as obvious as this may sound, nervous patients breathing irregularly exacerbates the feeling of panic.

All treatment carries risks. Individual consultation is required with one of our practitioners to ensure that the treatment is right for you.