Does a Patient’s Psychological Profile Influence Pain Experienced by Wisdom Teeth Removal?
An interesting article titled “Does Psychological Profile Influence Third Molar Extraction and Postoperative Pain?” appears in the 2017 edition of the Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery written by Gonzalez-Martinez et al. (vol. 75, pp. 484-490). The article explores if psychological distress is associated with higher levels of dental anxiety and pain following wisdom teeth surgery. Dental anxiety has been shown in studies to be present in 3% to 20% of the population and oral surgery has been shown to provoke the most anxiety. The authors feel that detecting dental anxiety early is essential and one tool for evaluating the psychological profile of an individual is the Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90). The authors devised a triple blinded study for patients having wisdom teeth extracted (surgeon, anesthetist, and patient). Patients presented at the University Hospital Casa de Salud of Valencia in … Read more