Of all the doctors and medical professionals that someone might need to visit during their lifetime, it is the dentist who strikes fear into more people than anyone else. It can range from mild nervousness to outright panic and at its worst a phobia that prevents the sufferer from getting the dental care that they need.
Fear of going to the dentist is something which affects men, women, teenagers, and children so age is no indicator of whether someone will be affected or not. What will differ are both the intensity of the fear and the underlying reasons behind it. Here are some of the most common ones and one or two ways to overcome them if they occur.
Previous bad experience: A long-term fear of going to the dentist can often be triggered by a single event such as painful extraction or extreme discomfort whilst a dental procedure was being performed in the past. Often the level of pain was less than the person believes it to have been but when they think about the experience it triggers anxiety each time they revisit their dentist, for fear of it occurring again.
The fact is the majority of dental procedures done by experts, are relatively painless due to the numbing agent used beforehand. Also, even after the procedure is complete and the numbing agent starts to wear off, any pain still felt will not be as high as one might imagine it to be.
