Abstract
Objective: This study compared the effectiveness of auditory distraction and brief relaxation therapy for reducing anxiety in patients undergoing tooth extraction. Methods: A non-blind, three-armed, randomized control trial was carried out. The targeted study population were patients who needed extraction of a non-restorable and non-mobile molar tooth. Eighty-six patients were recruited; the brief relaxation therapy and auditory distraction groups had 32 participants each, while 10 of the 22 participants in the control group were excluded due to missing data. The Hierarchical Anxiety Questionnaire was used to assess the anxiety level. The Mann–Whitney U or Kruskal–Wallis test was performed to compare means between the groups. The before and after comparisons in each group were carried out using the Wilcoxon Signed-Rank test. The alpha value was set at 0.05, and data were analyzed using SPSS version 24. Results: The mean anxiety score after brief relaxation therapy and auditory distraction had significantly decreased (p < 0.001). Although not significant (p = 0.13), there was a slight increase in the anxiety score of the study participants in the control group just before the extraction procedure. Brief relaxation therapy was significantly effective in reducing anxiety scores in comparison to the control group (MD = 5.87, 95% CI = 2.58, 9.17; p = 0.001), but auditory distraction was not (p = 0.14). Conclusion: Both auditory distraction and brief relaxation therapy were effective in reducing patient anxiety before a dental procedure. Furthermore, it would be interesting to learn if these findings remain consistent for more complex dental procedures, such as surgical removal of an impacted third molar.
Highlights
Introduction conditions of the Creative CommonsFear/anxiety, stress, and pain/sensitivity should be the three main considerations before any dental procedure is initiated [1,2,3]
Because the current study presents the findings for patients undergoing tooth extraction, in contrast to tooth restoration in the previous study [37], it is evident that brief relaxation therapy is applicable for simple and complex dental treatments
Inferior to brief relaxation therapy, this study demonstrated that auditory distraction does effectively reduce the anxiety level of patients undergoing tooth extraction
Summary
Fear/anxiety, stress, and pain/sensitivity should be the three main considerations before any dental procedure is initiated [1,2,3]. The anxiety related to dental procedures is considered to be developmentally normative and is prevalent in 54–92% of individuals [5,6]. If unaddressed, it may result in long-term fear eventually leading to avoidance of dental visits [7]. Highly anxious patients may end up remembering more anxiety-provoking dental experiences [8,9]
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