The use of general anaesthesia in special care dentistry: A clinical guideline from the British Society for Disability and Oral Health
Open accessAbstract
Background: General anaesthesia (GA) may be required to support the care of those seen in Special Care Dentistry (SCD) services for various reasons, such as enabling extensive dental care for people with severe learning disabilities or severe dental phobia. Guidance is needed for teams delivering SCD using GA due to the potential risks, implications, and costs of using GA to deliver dental care. Aim: To present evidence‐based recommendations, where possible, for teams involved in providing GA for dental care for adults within SCD services. Methods: A multidisciplinary working group, supported by a formal literature search and stakeholder involvement, iteratively produced and refined the recommendations presented. Results: There was little evidence to inform the guidelines. Recommendations are therefore based mainly on the working group's expert consensus opinion. Clinical guidelines are presented as a set of overarching principles followed by six key sections reflecting patients' pathways from referral to dental services through to their care during and after GA. Conclusion: Guidelines are presented to support those providing GA to provide SCD. The need for comprehensive and person‐centered assessment and planning is emphasized.
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Many patients with learning disabilities have serial general anaesthetics for dental treatment.
“Many patients with learning disabilities have serial general anaesthetics for dental treatment.”
From Implementation of a CBT-based dental anxiety management pathway for patients with learning disabilities (2024) · cites this paper as [12]
The Intra-operative Care section discusses repeated episodes of general anaesthesia for special care dentistry and recommends planning to reduce the need for further treatment. It does not establish that many patients with learning disabilities undergo serial general anaesthetics for dental treatment; the frequency and specific population in the claim are unsupported. No page number is available in our copy. (LLM, conf=0.79)
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Hughes, S., Davies, L., Monaghan, U., & Stennett, M. (2024) · British Dental Journal · doi:10.1038/s41415-024-7557-7 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
- Authors
- Geddis‐Regan, A. R., Gray, D., Buckingham, S., Misra, U., Boyle, C., & the British Society for Disability and Oral Health
- Affiliations
- North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust (GB)
- NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (GB)
- Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust (GB)
- South Tyneside and Sunderland NHS Foundation Trust (GB)
- Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Geddis‐Regan, Andrew R.
- Venue
- Special Care in Dentistry
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2022-01
- Volume
- 42
- Issue
- S1
- Pages
- 3-32
- ISSN
- 0275-1879 (ISSN-L)
- 1754-4505
- PMC
- PMC9303222
- OpenAlex
- W4205163580
- Cited by
- 65
- References
- 71
- Citations by year
- 2026: 17 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 11 · 2023: 28 · 2022: 4
- FWCI
- 11.74
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Special Care in Dentistry (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Newcastle University ePrints (Newcastle Univesity) (cc-by-nc-nd)
- Funders
- NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde
- King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
- Solent NHS Trust
- National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR300149)
- University of Cambridge
- King's College London
- University College London
- Royal College of Anaesthetists
- Association of Anaesthetists
- University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
- Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
- Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
- Topics
- Health Sciences › Dentistry › Oral Surgery › Dental Anxiety and Anesthesia Techniques
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine › Anesthesia and Sedative Agents
- Health Sciences › Dentistry › Periodontics › Dental Health and Care Utilization
- Keywords
- general anesthesia, special care dentistry, severe learning disabilities, dental phobia, adults with disabilities, person-centred care, clinical guidelines
- MeSH terms
- Adult, Anesthesia, Dental, Anesthesia, General, Persons with Disabilities, Humans, Oral Health
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