Soothing Shots: Local Anaesthesia in Paediatric Dentistry

Pediatric patients particularly display a decreased threshold to pain, owing due to their low pain-related self-efficacy and decreased cognitive coping. As the child grows from an infant to an adolescent, both these attributes increase, making the patient much easier to reassure and manage. Nevertheless, the sight of an injection induces a strong response from any individual. The patient faces a choice between pain from the procedure and pain from the anaesthetic needle. While fear can be both subjective and objective, it becomes the clinician’s duty to not only desensitize the patient but to ensure that the patient remains motivated to follow up on the dental treatment.Traditional methods of inducing local anaesthesia include injectable drugs using different injection techniques. However, anaesthetic failure in paediatric dentistry is common. Local anesthetics have made a great advancement in dentistry and have changed patients ’perspectives of dental procedures to a great extent. There is still room for the improvement of painless techniques in administrating local anesthetics. It is important for clinicians to be familiar with all the local anesthesia devices and techniques.