PAIN CONTROL IN CONSERVATIVE DENTISTRY AND ENDODONTICS – AN UPDATED REVIEW

*Shreya Shivangi, Ananya Guha, Richa Pandharikar, Rahul D. Rao, Meenakshi Verma and Ashish K. Jain

ABSTRACT

Understanding pain for better management is very crucial for any healthcare practitioner. Dental pain can be caused by several factors and can be of different types. The first step for managing dental pain is acquiring an accurate diagnosis. Assessment of pain is done using rating scales like Visual Analog scales and in the form of Questionnaires. Once diagnosis is made, there are various options that can be used alone or in combination for better management of pain. Unless the underlying cause of pain is removed none of the methods of pain control would work. There are many pharmacological and non-pharmacological approaches for relieving dental pain. Dental Anxiety can also lower threshold of pain in patients for which behavioural management should be attempted. Premedication before administering anaesthesia has also shown to make management of pain easier. The keystone of pain management is prescribing analgesics like NSAIDS, aspirin, and few opioids like morphine. Another method commonly used is the use of anaesthetics which can be given either topically or in injectable forms. Analgesia or conscious sedation can help overcome dental phobia and is used profoundly in children. Other alternative methods like hypnosis, acupuncture and audio-analgesia have also proven to be efficient for pain management. Recently, lasers have been studied for pain control too. Use of virtual reality for distraction methods has also shown to be effective. Various time-honoured home remedies are also used for the management of pain. Therefore, one must understand that approach to pain management is multidimensional.

Keywords: Anaesthetics, Analgesics, Dental pain, Endodontics, Home remedies, Pain Management.