Women suffer “extreme dental anxiety”

21 December 2010

WOMEN are twice as likely to suffer extreme anxiety when visiting the dentist compared to men, a new survey has found.

Nearly one in five women (19 per cent) felt “extreme dental anxiety” in the waiting room compared to just 10 per cent of men in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The finding was part of the 2009 Adult Dental Health Survey published by the NHS Information Centre.

The survey also found that 15 per cent of adults aged 16 to 24 and 25 to 34 had “extreme dental anxiety” compared to nine per cent of adults over 85. The report has been published every 10 years since 1968 and this is the first time researchers have measured levels of anxiety amongst the adults who took part.

Individuals were asked to rate the level of anxiety they would feel if they were in particular dental situations, including the need to go for dental treatment, sitting in the dentist’s waiting room and waiting to have a tooth drilled.

The Modified Dental Anxiety Scale (MDAS) was used to measure anxiety and the results show that:

• 12 per cent of all adults were classified as having extreme dental anxiety

• 30 per cent of all adults were extremely anxious about having a tooth drilled and 28 per cent were extremely anxious about having an injection

• The majority of adults said that they would be anxious if they were about to have a tooth drilled (72 per cent) or have an injection into their gum (70 per cent).

• A greater proportion of women than men had dental anxiety on all five dimensions of the MDAS scale – 17 per cent for women overall and 8 per cent for men.

Ian O’Sullivan from the Office for National Statistics, who conducted the research, said: “Just over half (51 per cent) of adults who had ever been to the dentist were classified as having low or no dental anxiety, but over a third (36 per cent) were classified as having moderate dental anxiety, and 12 per cent of adults were shown to have 'extreme anxiety'.”