919-682-5327 Sedation dentistry is the practice of administering various sedatives to ease a patient during dental procedures to minimize pain felt and remove any anxiety they may have during a dental treatment. If you suffer from any stress or anxiety, your dentist can provide you with a selection of sedation treatments to help you relax and prepare for any dentistry treatments you may need.
For a better understanding of the basics of sedation dentistry, listed below are examples of effective sedatives:
– Oral sedatives are pills provided to be manually swallowed by a patient to help them relax. Even though oral sedatives can be used to de-stress people, the dosage can be adjusted to put patients to sleep if need be. The one downside to oral sedatives is they often take up to an hour before the effect can be felt.
– Inhaled sedatives are gases intended to be breathed in by a patient to help them relax for dental treatments. The most widely used gas is laughing gas, which is a mixture of oxygen and nitrous oxide. Laughing gas is safe and effective, and the only kind of sedative administered in which it is safe for a patient to drive themselves home after treatment.
– Deep sedatives are implemented with intensive dental services that require the patient to be unconscious. Anesthesia is tremendously powerful and will put a patient into a deep sleep from which they will not awake until the sedative has fully run its course.
– Intravenous sedatives are injections delivered immediately into a patient’s bloodstream. Intravenous sedatives are fast-acting and can often deliver instant results, allowing them to be used very close to the dental procedure, with minimal wait time needed afterward.
If you would like to set up an appointment to discuss your possible sedation dentistry treatment with Dr. Alex Fleming and our team at Fleming Dental, please call 919-682-5327 to set up a visit to our dentist office in Durham, North Carolina. Let us help you achieve a healthy smile!