The management of patients with periodontal disease and anxiety – case report

Abstract

The worldwide high prevalence, alongside both modifiable and unmodifiable risk factors and local causal factors of the periodontal disease lead to bone and periodontal gum attachment loss. It is not considered a systemic disease but there are pathological influences between general diseases such as diabetes mellitus and periodontal disease. Anxiety of dental settlement is a main factor that prevent patients from addressing to a regular follow-up or, worse, to obtain the personalized treatment from the beginning of dental conditions. We present a case of a 24-year-old male that postponed his presentation to dentist until pain prevented him from a proper sleep. He required a complete history and clinical examination in order to identify his dental emergency and, also, the dentist anxiety he developed during his lifetime. His management required a complex treatment, fractioned in multiple session, in order to help him overcome his anxiety and to obtain a good outcome. The case particularity include the lack of proper oral hygiene, due to the acute and/or chronic pain that the patient encountered, alongside with the fear of the dentist and the dental office, that delayed the presentation to a specialist to the moment when pain was unbearable and represented a medical emergency.