Comparison of acceptance, preference and efficacy between pressure anesthesia and classical needle infiltration anesthesia for dental restorative procedures in adult patients.
BACKGROUND
Intraoral local anesthesia is essential for delivering dental care. Needless devices have been developed to provide anesthesia without injections. Little controlled research is available on its use in dental restorative procedures in adult patients. The aims of this study were to compare adult patients acceptability and preference for needleless jet injection with classical local infiltration as well as to evaluate the efficacy of the needleless anesthesia.


METHODS
Twenty non fearful adults with no previous experience of dental anesthesia were studied using split-mouth design. The first procedure was performed with classical needle infiltration anesthesia. The same amount of anesthetic solution was administered using MADA jet needleless device in a second session one week later, during which a second dental restorative procedure was performed. Patients acceptance was assessed using Universal pain assessment tool while effectiveness was recorded using soft tissue anesthesia and pulpal anesthesia. Patients reported their preference for the anesthetic method at the third visit. The data was evaluated using chi square test and student's t-test.


RESULTS
Pressure anesthesia was more accepted and preferred by 70% of the patients than traditional needle anesthesia (20%). Both needle and pressure anesthesia was equally effective for carrying out the dental procedures.


CONCLUSIONS
Patients experienced significantly less pain and fear (p<0.01) during anesthetic procedure with pressure anesthesia. However, for more invasive procedures needle anesthesia will be more effective.
Department of Conservative Dentistry and Endodontics, VSPM's Dental College & Research Centre, Nagpur, Maharashtra, India.
Chetana Sachin
CS
Makade
Department of Conservative Dentistry and Endodontics, VSPM's Dental College & Research Centre, Nagpur, Maharashtra, India.
Pratima R
PR
Shenoi
Department of Conservative Dentistry and Endodontics, VSPM's Dental College & Research Centre, Nagpur, Maharashtra, India.
Mohit K
MK
Gunwal
Injection pain; jet injection; local anesthesia; needleless anesthesia; oral anesthesia; pressure anesthesia