For some patients, dental visits can be overly stressful—sometimes to the point that patients will avoid them altogether. At Winchester Dental, we understand this! We can provide a conscious sedation solution to greatly reduce stress, and help fearful patients relax before and during their appointments. In this video, Dr. Gio explains the benefits of conscious sedation and how it works.
Transcript:
We often find we get new patients that come to us that haven’t been to the dentist for a while. A lot of that stems from them being very anxious or nervous. So there is what’s called conscious sedation. It’s—or what I like to say: “happy pill.” Patients that are too nervous or anxious—we talk about giving them a little pill at night, the night before the appointment, to help them sleep—and then one the morning of, an hour before the appointment. So by the time they come and see us, I tell patients, “You’re still up, breathing, walking, talking; you’re just a little bit more relaxed,”; almost, I like to say, like you’ve had three or four cocktails. So, coming in in that condition allows you to better relax in the chair.
The appointments go great; patients usually—a lot of patients—have amnesia, partial amnesia from it, and don’t even—the next day don’t remember the visit. So they love that as well. Takes the stress off—typically, we schedule early morning appointment, because the medication works best on an empty stomach. We do the appointment, then we usually recommend you go home. Most patients will take a two-hour nap, get up for lunch. We usually recommend someone give them lots of water, start flushing the stuff out of the system, and then by that night, they’re almost usually back to 100%. What I hear a lot of, because we’ve minimized the stress in the body and in the brain, we find that the procedures then don’t hurt. Patients say everything feels great! So a lot less stress goes a long way to having a great dental visit, and then healthy strong teeth.