The smell of a dental practice heavily impacts the way people think, feel and act, even without us knowing. Fear of the treatment or equipment being used may be a recognisable cause of anxiety to patients, but smells encountered within the practice and during care can also have a significant effect.
It’s important to assess this for both patients and clinicians. The same environment can have different implications for each group. For example, the ‘dentophobic’ patient could become anxious and experience an increased heart rate, sweating and breathing just in the presence of dental stimuli. For the dental professional, practices are just an everyday place of care, and outstanding elements in the environment may be completely innocuous.
Making changes that positively impact both groups is therefore key.
Smells and the patient
Anatomically, the neurological systems for olfaction and emotion are very close. They are heavily linked; odours can induce emotional states on a reliable basis, and our emotions can change the perception of smell too.
Dental specific smells can create negative emotional responses. The scent of cut dentine and bone, or materials containing eugenol have been identified as potential anxiety triggers. Eugenol, in particular, can linger in the dental practice as it is a widely used product in clinical dentistry, but the odour may provoke patients to recall memories of unpleasant dental care experiences.
With the current evidence, it’s possible to say that a practice’s odour can influence patients throughout their treatment. If patients feel anxious regarding dental procedures, they may engage with avoidance behaviours, which worsens their oral hygiene, delays treatment and intervention, and compromises outcomes.
Anxiety also affects pain perception in some dental treatments. When an individual is nervous of a procedure, they experience a greater physical reaction to painful treatment. Where we know that smell can impact dental anxiety, a change of fragrance may improve this aspect of care.
The impact of olfaction has been explored in general healthcare, and findings suggest that whilst an odour may not affect pain threshold or tolerance, it may change the qualitative (intensity) measures of pain in response to stimuli. If patients experience more pleasant smells, they could experience reduced pain intensity, which may improve their perception of treatment.
Nose blindness
Clinicians must also beware the prospect of nose blindness, or olfactory fatigue. This phenomenon occurs in environments that we occupy regularly, and therefore become indifferent to any odours within this environment. In the dental practice, the scent of eugenol may be unnoticeable to clinicians, and won’t affect them in the same way that it could impact patients.
However, the literature found that anxious body odours make dental professionals perform worse in clinical tasks. If patients are anxious, this uncontrollable – and unconscious – response may influence the clinical team, and their subsequent care.
A breath of fresh air
Our sense of smell could affect patient anxiety and pain perception, as well as clinical performance. Making an effective change against the everyday odours in your practice could therefore be beneficial for all involved parties.
A solution like Initial Essence, an air freshening system from Initial Medical, could have a positive impact. It utilises state-of-the-art oxygen fuel cell technology to provide long lasting fragrance in a range of scents: Adore, Elate, Spring and Neutra-lox. Initial Essence is effective against transient odours, such as tobacco and sweat, and can have an immediate and prolonged impact on your practice.
Both clinicians and patients will appreciate a pleasant-smelling practice. Aside from it being a common nicety, it can have a range of impacts on clinical outcomes. Making a prominent change isn’t something to turn your nose up at.
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