Can dental hygienists provide anesthesia or use other techniques to reduce discomfort?
Pain control should be an integral part of nonsurgical periodontal therapies. This is true whether the dental hygienist calgary can directly administer local anesthesia or the supervising dentist performs this procedure.Local anesthesia should be a standard procedure performed before nonsurgical periodontal therapies. It is important that the clinician let the patient know of the standard at the initial examination appointment as well as when scheduling future appointments.
The objective is to discuss the procedure before the actual administration of local anesthesia. This allows the patient to say at an early juncture that they do not want local anesthesia, at which point the clinician should explore the patient’s concerns. The clinician can inform the patient that most patients need it for comfort and to allow for the best treatment. Keep in mind that the short amount of time for local anesthesia allows much more time for the actual treatment on a patient.
With additional State certification, New York licensed dental hygienists may administer and monitor local infiltration anesthesia (for example, novocaine administered by needle) and nitrous oxide analgesia (an inhaled gas) during the practice of dental hygiene. These activities must be supervised personally by a licensed dentist.
