• Dental Phobia Support

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Maybe this site will help others

Colin65

Colin65

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 31, 2012
Messages
144
http://www.******************/
 
It had some good information but I didn't like how it sort of stated that phobic patients were an inconvenience for dentists :(
 
It had some good information but I didn't like how it sort of stated that phobic patients were an inconvenience for dentists :(

Yeah, that was kind of my feeling about it. A lot of the stories seemed to have an undercurrent of "this patient was a right pain in the a**e, this is how we fixed them so they don't annoy us so much now" to the tone.

It's also worth noting, that while their "Dental Phobia Certified" thing for dentists may have some value, the only dentist in my area listed is one I would *not* go to in a million years (long story but I do have reasons), and the real phobia expert in the area is not listed. I think that tells you everything you need to know.

So, could be useful, but proceed with caution.
 
It had some good information but I didn't like how it sort of stated that phobic patients were an inconvenience for dentists :(

Where does it state that nervous patients are an inconvenience please, I have looked at this site and thought it was okay. It could be that I have missed the bit you saw. :butterfly:
 
Where does it state that nervous patients are an inconvenience please, I have looked at this site and thought it was okay. It could be that I have missed the bit you saw. :butterfly:

Can't speak for zombiegroupie, but for me it struck me when I read this example: http://www.******************/casestudies/fear-anaesthetised.html - I feel there's a wee bit too much emphasis on blaming Pablo for the problem as he didn't ask for a "top up" and was over extrapolating from a previous bad experience. I've had issues with persistent local anaesthetic failure which turned out to really be true and really not be a misunderstanding of previous experiences on my part and the way this example is written, while it acknowledges that this can occasionally be the case, it feels pretty dismissive of that possibility. Unfortunately it's the only example on the site that deals with local anaesthetic failure, there isn't one where it didn't turn out to be the patient being wrong. That feels dismissive of my (very real, even if it is rare) experience.

Hope that makes sense!


Also, see this example - http://www.******************/casestudies/fear-needles.html:


"The problem now was that his phobia was becoming very disruptive to the dental practice where he was registered as a patient." ...and later on..."In addition, his anxiety would bring on other involuntary reactions such as a dry mouth, palpitations, sweating, trembling, over-breathing, feeling dizzy and light-headed, feeling sick and even fainting. All of these additional symptoms are common for phobia sufferers and all contribute to making a patient difficult to treat unless their dentist can help them to manage their phobia."


My feeling is that there's useful stuff in there but I find the tone a bit alienating in places.



(Re. who appears on their "dental phobia certified" list and who doesn't, I won't go into that as it would give too much away but can PM if you want to verify.)

 
I've been giving this some more thought:

I think part of it is that the site is as much geared towards dentists as it is towards patients, so a certain amount of the emphasis in the stories they have on there is on what the benefit of addressing the patient's phobia would be for the dentist. Selling the concept of helping phobic patients to dentists, as it were.

What's making me uncomfortable, I think, is that the sales pitch they have gone for is "the patient was disruptive and hard to treat, doing this will improve that" (see quotes in my previous post) rather than "we should help patients who have phobias because nobody should have to feel that way about going to the dentist". The emphasis is more on business interests and less on simple kindness and the patients' interests.

My hygienist, who is awesome, has said a couple of times "we don't want anybody coming in here and feeling afraid!"…not because it's difficult for them, but because feeling afraid is horrible and they care.
 
yeah it seems like referring to the phobia as disruptive was just, not very patient friendly.

there's nothing that makes you more nervous than an annoyed or rushed dentist, IMO
 
there's nothing that makes you more nervous than an annoyed or rushed dentist, IMO

^ This.


There's two ways dentists can view/approach your dental phobia. They can approach it as a dentistry-related problem that you need their help with (not a whole lot different to how they might see a tooth that's trickier than usual to extract due to funny roots, for example), or they can view it as an obstacle that prevents them from getting on with their real job (i.e. doing your teeth).

The best dentists do the former and go out of their way to help, this site appears to be doing the latter.

It's just one of your additional needs as a dental patient. It's no different to additional needs other people might have as dental patients due to wonky or unusual teeth. Your needs matter just as much as anybody else's - the suggestion in the second link I posted earlier that the phobic patient's needs was disrupting other patients' treatment was a particularly cheap shot I thought. (See http://www.******************/casestudies/fear-needles.html - 3rd paragraph in)
 
Yes, I have a mouth full of wonky teeth as well as a time consuming phobia. It's definitely embarrassing enough without the dentist acting exasperated
 
But the one dentist listed in Glasgow isn't Mike Gow!; the dentist profession's foremost expert on dental phobia who practices in Glasgow. Hmm - doesn't inspire me really! I haven't read the rest of the site though.
This site (Dental Fear Central) isn't listed in the links....
Still the world doesn't revolve around us and it will likely help lots of people:)
 
I had not read any of this site before posting so didn't realise it referred to patients like that, seems it's not too helpful after all, sorry about that.
 
Don't worry about it Colin :) Lots of it actually is useful info and it's only when you start to read some of the case studies that the tone gets a bit iffy, very easy to miss.
 
I presume all that's involved in the "certification" process for "Dental phobia certified dentists" is that you pay a fee, and in exchange for the payment, you get listed (I've heard that it's not an insignificant amount, either). The fee has to be paid each year, otherwise the dentist gets de-listed.

Obviously that's not to say that the dentists who are listed there aren't any good (in fact, some of them enjoy helping nervous patients overcome their fears). But it's a purely commercial website.
 
I presume all that's involved in the "certification" process for "Dental phobia certified dentists" is that you pay a fee, and in exchange for the payment, you get listed (I've heard that it's not an insignificant amount, either). The fee has to be paid each year, otherwise the dentist gets de-listed.

Obviously that's not to say that the dentists who are listed there aren't any good (in fact, some of them enjoy helping nervous patients overcome their fears). But it's a purely commercial website.

Yes sounds like an advertisement.
 
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