Fear and anxiety in patients undergoing minor oral surgery

Objective: This study was carried out to determine the causes of fear and anxiety in consecutive patients who attended the University of Benin Teaching Hospital for minor oral surgical treatment. Method: All consenting consecutive patients referred for minor oral surgery were studied. Information on all the patients was entered into a pre-designed data form. The treatment procedures were carefully explained to the patients in English, \'Pidgin\' English, and the local languages of the patients. The patients were interviewed before and after treatment with regard to fear and anxiety relating to the treatment procedure. Results: One hundred and fifty patients aged 18-85 years, (mean age 33.4 years) were studied. Fifty-eight percent and Forty-two percent of the patients reported being anxious and fearful respectively, about the treatment they were about to receive. More patients (40.3%) feared the dental nurse than the needle. More females (36.4%) were anxious about treatment than males (20.1%). The patients in the age range of 21-30 years (32.6%) expressed fear and anxiety more than the other age groups. About half of the patients that attended for exodontia expressed more anxiety about treatment. Less than one half of the patients (44.2%) thought their fears were justified after treatment. Verbal communication allayed fear and anxiety in 70.8% of the patients studied. Conclusions: Fear and anxiety about what will happen to the patient\'s teeth are barriers identified in this study for undertaking of minor oral surgical procedures at the centre. This study reinforces the need for verbal communication as an effective means of allaying the patient\'s fear and anxiety before treatment Keywords: Fear, anxiety, minor oral surgeryNigerian Dental Journal Vol. 15 (2) 2007: pp. 71-7

‘Incidence Of Dry Socket\' In Benin City: Analysis Of 21 Cases

‘Dry socket' quite often complicates extraction of teeth. The purpose of this study was to analyse the cases of dry socket seen in our hospital in order to provide baseline data for future comparison and prevention. The case-notes of all patients who had intra-alveolar extractions between 1994 and 2002 were obtained from the medical records Department of the Dental hospital and analysed for age, gender, tooth/teeth extracted, mode of extraction and treatment. Of the 11, 572 teeth extracted within the review period, 0.18% of the extraction sockets were infected. The lower molar sockets (76.2%) were more commonly infected than the sockets of the other teeth. Extraction sockets of females were more commonly infected than males. About 60.0% of dry sockets occurred in the age group 18 to 30 years. The average time of reporting pain and infection of socket was 3.4 days although 35% of patients who had pain reported within 48 hours of extraction. Zinc oxide/Eugenol dressing was the mainstay of treatment after irrigation of the socket with normal saline. The low incidence of dry socket in this review shows that it is not a common complication of tooth extraction in our hospital. Keywords: Dry socket, incidence Annals of Biomedical Science Vol. 2 (2) 2003: pp. 82-8

Antibiotic Susceptibility Pattern of Aetiologic Agents of Bacteraemia Associated with Dental Extractions.

The antibiotic susceptibility pattern of the aetiologic agents of bacteraemia following dental extractions was surveyed. Seventy-eight bacterial isolates were obtained, of which 61 (78.2%) were facultative anaerobes (including microaerophiles), and 17 (21.8%) were obligate anaerobes. Among the facultative anaerobes and microaerophiles, the most frequently isolated bacteria were species of Staphylococcus (24.4%), Streptococcus (20.5%), and á-haemolytic streptococci (12.8%); Bacteriodes spp. (10.3%) were the most frequently isolated anaerobes. The organisms were more sensitive to ciprofloxacin than to any other antibiotics as all but the S. aureus isolates (89.5%) were uniformly sensitive. The least effective was tetracycline. Only 7 (9.0%) of the 78 isolates were sensitive to this antibiotic.Keywords: Dental extraction, Bacteraemia, aetiologic agents

Body dimensions of Fulani and Yoruba ecotype chickens under intensive systems of management

One hundred and thirty- three (133) day old chicks consisting of sixty-seven (67) Fulani ecotype chicks and sixty-six (66) Yoruba ecotype chicks were used in a 12-weeks study to compare body weight and 10 body parameters of birds under the intensive system of management. Results showed that the Fulani ecotype chicks had better live weight from week 1 – 12 (p>0.05) (live weight: 32.30±3.74 - 461.50±102.06g for females and 34.00±3.73- 552.43±104.98g for males) while the Yoruba ecotype chicks had lower live weights (24.27±1.55-394.46±29.86g for females and 24.09±1.48- 395.92±17.85g for males respectively). The Fulani type also had superior values for breast breadth and length, with values ranging from 2.06±0.37- 11.14±1.49cm for male breast length and 1.92±0.28- 10.45±1.14cm for female breast length. The breast breadth had values of 2.60±0.53- 2.60±0.53cm for males and 2.64±0.49- 8.60±0.99cm for females. The Yoruba ecotype chickens however had superior values (p>0.05) for comb length (0.58±0.9- 2.30±0.37cm for males, 0.62±0.09-1.72±0.19cm) and beak length (1.32±0.11- 2.94±0.13cm for males, 1.27±0.08-2.82±0.16cm for females), throughout the study period. Wing length also changed in the same way from week 7 for females and week 9 for males to favour values recorded for the Yoruba ecotype chickens. All other parameters were higher (p>0.05) for the Fulani ecotype chickens. It was concluded that the Fulani ecotype chicken has potentials to be selected as meat type chickens while the Yoruba ecotype chickens has potentials to be selected more as egg type chickens. Key Words: Indigenous, local, Mean, Standard deviatio

Knowledge and Attitude of clinical level dental students concerning HIV/AIDS

Objective: To determine the knowledge and attitude of clinical level dental students concerning Human Immunodeficiency Virus/Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (HIV/AIDS). Methods: Two hundred and fifteen clinical level dental students from three Nigerian universities were requested to complete a self- administered questionnaire related to knowledge and attitudes about HIV/AIDS. Parameters assessed included the aetiology and modes of transmission, high- risk groups, common oral and general manifestations, diagnosis, treatment and prevention of HIV/AIDS. Results: The male to female ratio was approximately 1:1, with an age range of 20-36 years. The respondents exhibited excellent knowledge of the aetiologic agent, the modes of transmission, high- risk groups, common oral manifestations and prevention of HIV/AIDS. However, they were less knowledgeable about the general features, diagnosis, treatment, aims of treatment and infection control measures. One hundred and sixty (70.4%) of the respondents stated that they did not have any reservations dealing with patients with HIV/AIDS while 55 (29.6%) felt that with improved knowledge they would be more confident in issues related to HIV/AIDS. Conclusion: Although Nigerian dental students exhibited good knowledge and positive attitude concerning HIV/AIDS, this study showed that knowledge of laboratory investigations and infection control measures were poor. These areas need emphasis in the dental school curriculum. Keywords: Knowledge, attitude, dental student, HIV/AIDSNigerian Dental Journal Vol. 15 (1) 2007: pp. 3-

Effectiveness Of Different House-Hold Hand Washing Agents On Hand Flora

Hand hygiene is a very important procedure in infection control. Washing agents commonly in use were investigated for their effectiveness in reducing hand floral and cotton towel was used as drying agent. Agents studied include; water alone, carex soap, dettol, and imperial leather. The hands were inoculated (deliberate contamination) with nasal swab and glove put on to allow inoculums to be established. The test hand was washed with the selected washing agent and dried with cloth towel three times while the other hand serving as the reference (and control) remained gloved. Glove was later removed from the other hand and both hands (un-gloved) were inoculated on nutrient agar plates and incubated for 24 hours at 370C. The colony forming units were counted for both treated (washed and dried) and untreated hands and percentage reduction was calculated. The procedure was repeated three times and average result with standard deviation presented for each washing agent. All the hand washing agents showed significant difference between treated and untreated hands (P ‹ 0.05). Imperial leather gave the highest reduction of 87.76%, followed by carex 71.05% then Dettol with 53.58%. Water gave the average lowest in colony forming unit reduction of 15.08%. The study concluded that washing hand with any of the house-hold soap washing agents is more effective as hand hygiene than water alone but Imperial leather showed the highest reduction in hand flora with cloth towel as drying agent.Keyword: hand washing, hand flora, cloth towelThe Tropical Journal of Health Sciences Vol 19 No 1 (January 201