Fear of the dentist. Now what is that called? I need what? You are not putting a hoe in my mouth. How many times have I heard this? Not to often, because at Healthy Body Dental we take the time to do a comprehensive exam and then we listen to what you want to do with your teeth and we explain the solutions and the benefits that are needed for your overall oral health.

It is a small wonder that dental patients of the past have feared dental treatment when such misunderstanding existed about dental vocabulary. Many instruments used in dentistry share nomenclature with tools that would conjure up horror when associated with dental therapy. Some more common ones are the explorer, probe, needle, drill, hoe, plugger, carver, and so on. Who, in their right mind could be calm when within one dental appointment they would be explored, probed before getting needled in preparation to be drilled or hoed, so they could be plugged, after which only the carving was left. Now that wasn’t so bad: Ha Compared to what? Even if the dental therapy did did not cause sensory discomfort, the mental agony was lasting, and all too memorable.

Even the treatment modalities discussed today can be frightening. Example of Fear. Root-Canals brings deep imaginings of a deep internal reaming of a body part as if the very soul was being pursued through a tooth. In reality, root canal therapy is a systematic cleaning of unhealthy tissue from the center of a tooth, the shaping of that residual space and finally the placement of a filling material to seal that space.

Sensory discomfort in the dental chair can be eliminated with modern dental materials and techniques. Mental and emotional discomfort in the dental chair is a much more personal ambition that would only come when dental personnel and patients both understand that words and names do too.