Factors affecting dental attendance following treatment for dental anxiety in primary dental care.
OBJECTIVE
To explore factors affecting patients' dental attendance behaviour following referral from a dental anxiety clinic to a general dental practitioner.


METHODS
A four-year follow up of patients who completed a course of treatment for dental anxiety by conducting semi-structured interviews, face-to-face or by telephone, with confirmation of dental attendance from the dental records.


METHODS
Forty-one patients who had completed a course of treatment for dental anxiety, in a specially designed community clinic. Mean time since last dental visit before treatment was 7.8 years (range 0.5-29).


RESULTS
Twenty-three patients were successfully followed up and 11 (47%) were receiving regular asymptomatic dental care. The dental anxiety scores of those who subsequently became asymptomatic attenders were significantly lower at follow-up than the patients who became symptomatic attenders (P = 0.01). Effective dentist-patient communication was a common theme of the interviews.


CONCLUSIONS
At four-year follow-up, dental anxiety was substantially lower in those who subsequently became asymptomatic attenders than those who became symptomatic attenders. A positive dentist-patient relationship had developed with the asymptomatic attenders.
Dailey
Y M
YM
University of Liverpool. Y.M.Dailey@liverpool.ac.uk
Crawford
A N
AN
Humphris
G
G
Lennon
M A
MA
D000328:Adult; D003190:Comprehensive Dental Care / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D016854:Dental Anxiety / Q000628:therapy*; D003812:Dentist-Patient Relations; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D005792:General Practice, Dental; D006801:Humans; D007407:Interviews as Topic; D008297:Male; D008347:Manifest Anxiety Scale; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric