2017 Volume 55 Issue 3 Pages 358-363
General anesthesia is sometimes used as a behavior management technique during dental treatment performed for young children or mentally disabled individuals. Recently, the number of patients who undergo treatment under general anesthesia at our clinic has been increasing, suggesting its growing importance for dental treatment of uncooperative children. We surveyed the attitudes of parents in regard to dental treatment under general anesthesia for their children. Parents of children with special needs or without systemic disease but lacking a cooperative attitude were included in this study. The enrolled patients were 56 boys and 44 girls, and their average age was 5 years 3 months. Of those, 78 were considered to be uncooperative with the treatment procedures, 11 were disabled, and 11 had a systemic disease. Forty-nine percent of the parents requested dental treatment under general anesthesia for their child at the initial visit. In a questionnaire regarding parental understanding of dental treatment under general anesthesia, “Satisfied” and “Basically Satisfied” comprised 98% of the answers, indicating that such treatment at our clinic meets the needs of the vast majority of our patients.
