Dental Treatment under Sedation Anaesthesia

What is sedation(conscious sedation)?

Dental treatment under conscious sedation can be advised to patients who are-

• Very apprehensive of dental treatment
• Small children where getting cooperation for doing extensive dental work is difficult
• Patients undergoing placement of Dental Implants(usually multiple) who would rather sleep through the procedure than see instruments going in and out of their mouth.

During the dental procedure under conscious sedation, a combination of analgesics(painkillers) along with sedative and relaxants is administered to calm the patient. The patient feels drowsy and relaxed and is calm during the procedure. The patients usually fall asleep but are conscious enough to be able to respond and can also be awakened easily as the sedative is titrated during the procedure. During the procedure, the pulse and the heart rate, as well as the oxygenation, is monitored by our very experienced anesthetist.

A local anesthetic agent has to also be administered so that the surgical site does not pain.

Usual pre and post instructions for the patient for conscious sedation

• The patient should be on an empty stomach so that there is no chance of nausea or vomiting
• The patient is advised not to drive themselves after the procedure
• We prefer if the patient is accompanied by an adult
• Usually, we ask the patient to wait for about 2 hours after the procedure so that the effects of the sedative wear out completely.