MEDICAL EMERGENCIES IN DENTAL OFFICE

Life threatening emergencies can and do occur in dental practice setting. They can happen to anyone: patient, doctor, member of the office staff or person who is merely accompanying a patient. The dentist has responsibility to recognise them and initiate primary emergency management procedures in an effort to reduce morbidity and mortality when such adverse event arise. Although the occurrence of life threatening emergencies in dental office is infrequent a number of factors exist today that can increase the likelihood of such incidents.