Many are well informed about different diseases that involve oral cavities. Fortunately, several medications assist in treating these diseases. Dentists or dental professionals prescribe drugs for dental care, depending on the issue. Specific medications are offered to prevent or treat infection, reduce anxiety, minimize pain and inflammation, treat bacterial infections, teeth cleaning or whitening, and many others.
Overall, this article will get you acquainted with some types of medications dental professionals use in caring for their patient’s teeth. If you want to know them, then read them on.
- Conscious Sedation Drugs
Many individuals experience anxiety when visiting a dentist. As such, a dentist may apply conscious sedation to ease such feelings. Conscious sedation is part of sedation dentistry in which a dentist alleviates dental anxiety by using sedative medications.
The National Institutes of Health stated that you’ll still be awake through conscious sedation. However, you’ll become more unmindful of the dental procedure. Also, you may forget what occurred afterward. Note that conscious sedation differs from general anesthesia, which assists in making you wholly unconscious, and dentists generally employ this for lengthy dental procedures.
Altogether, various conscious sedation drugs can allow you to feel more at ease during the dental session; two of those are:
- Propofol
This is a medication carried out through injection in the person’s vein. This drug consists of oil, soybean, egg lecithin, and glycerol. And so, it may result in pain during injection that may not occur if the dentist uses an anesthetic as a mixture with the drug.
Note that it begins to function in just 90 to 100 seconds. And as it’s cleared immediately by the body, the dentist may use it constantly during the dental procedure. Likewise, the patient will usually recover fast once the dentist has finished the dental process.
- Dexmedetomidine
This powerful sedative medication leads a person into a sleep pattern that’s somewhat like normal sleep. However, the dentist can still generally interact with the individual. Dexmedetomidine is administered steadily into the person’s vein over the entire dental procedure, and it can affect a person’s heart rate and breathing. As such, a dentist might usually administer this in low doses.
Overall, suppose you’re having dental issues or have undergone facial injuries that resulted in broken teeth or jaw bone. In that case, conscious sedation may be administered to you as you get reconstructive surgery to treat the problem.
- Topical Analgesics
Dentists utilize dental analgesics to reduce irritation or pain that can come from various conditions, such as gum disease or sores in or around the mouth (such as canker sores, fever blisters, and cold sores). In addition, some of these medications are used to reduce irritation or pain that results from dentures or other dental devices, such as braces. Analgesics can be found over-the-counter or by your dentist’s prescription. You can obtain them in various forms, such as dental paste, ointments, aerosol spray, solutions, lozenges, and gel.
Likewise, note that pain relievers used for the person’s gums must not be used for teething. Not only does the saliva wash the medication fast, but the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cautions against harmful and possibly life-threatening side effects of having such dental products in small children and infants.
- Antibiotics
Antibiotics like amoxicillin (Amoxil) and penicillin are developed to treat various infections that may happen after a dental procedure. Dentists often prescribe Erythromycin (Benzamycin, Ilotycin, Emgel, Staticin, Ery) whenever a person has some form of allergies to amoxicillin and penicillin.
Likewise, there are other types of antibiotics that you should know, such as:
- Chlorhexidine is an antibiotic for managing plaque and gingivitis in the patient’s periodontal pockets (space between the tooth and gum) or the mouth.
- Tetracyclines such as doxycycline are employed for treating periodontal disease.
- Clindamycin (Cleocin HCL) is usually used to address severe infections from susceptible anaerobic bacteria. Thus, it’s good for dental abscesses in the dental soft tissue and bone that don’t correspond correctly with erythromycin or penicillin.
Take note that another application of dental antibiotics is to prevent bacteria that constantly exist on the surface of the tissue around the person’s teeth from transferring into the blood. This is particularly crucial for people with some form of defective or artificial heart valves since bacteria that are transmitted into the blood have the potential to remain on the person’s heart valves and cause severe infections.
Bottomline
Various diseases involve oral cavities. The good news is some medications can help with addressing these diseases. Some examples of those dental medications are topical analgesics, antibiotics, and conscious sedation drugs.
Overall, if you take any dental medications, ensure that you’re aware of why you’ll take them. Also, be honest with your dentist about any health issues you might have before taking them.
