title: Stress amongst primary dental care patients.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  to determine the prevalence of dental fear amongst primary dental care units (PDCU) patients and to characterize them according to socio-demographic features.
  
  
  METHODS
  non-probabilistic sampling on new and consecutive patients demanding exodontia at the Burela, Praza do Ferrol and Viveiro (Lugo) PDCUs from 9 january to 7 march and from 18 june to 21 september 2007. The variables considered were "demographic" (age, gender, address and educational level), "treatment-related" (reason for extraction, root extraction), "attitudes" (accompanied yes/no, spontaneous fear comments yes/no) and "stress" determined using a visual analogue scale (VAS).
  
  
  RESULTS
  A total of 804 patients entered the study. The mean VAS value was 3.54+/-2.63 (range 0 to 10; median 2.95; mode 0). A 96.8% referred some degree of stress, and a 10.1% of the sample scored high values (>7.5 in the scale). These values resulted to be influenced by sex (p=0.000), address (p=0.025) and by the presence of an accompanying person in the room (p=0.008). Logistic regression analysis identifies female gender (OR=3.26; 95%CI: 1.93 , 5.49), urban (OR=2.02 95%CI: 1.04 , 3.91) or rural (OR=2.16; 95%CI: 1.15 , 4.08) address and the absence of an accompanying person in the room (OR=1.68; 95%CI: 1.05 , 2.70) as predictors for a high level of stress.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  A 10.1% of the patients experience a high level of stress before tooth extraction. This phenomenon is more common among unaccompanied women from rural or urban areas.
authors: Centro de Salud de Burela, Lugo, Spain.
authors: Luis Miguel
authors: LM
authors: Rodríguez Vázquez
authors: Emilio
authors: E
authors: Rubiños López
authors: Almudena
authors: A
authors: Varela Centelles
authors: Ana Isabel
authors: AI
authors: Blanco Otero
authors: Flor
authors: F
authors: Varela Otero
authors: Pablo
authors: P
authors: Varela Centelles
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D016854:Dental Anxiety / Q000453:epidemiology*; D003729:Dental Care; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000453:epidemiology*