DentiSign is very effective in reducing the level of anxiety in children/adults who are hard of hearing, improving behavior positively during dental treatment and aiding in developing a positive dental attitude among those who are hard of hearing.
Dental anxiety can prevent patients from cooperating totally during dental treatment. Dentists need to understand the anxiety and its repercussions in dental care so that a relationship of trust may be established with the patient for the implementation of strategies aimed at reducing the anxiety caused by dental treatment.
Anxiety reducing strategies are further compromised in hearing impaired children/adults because of their problem in communicating with others, and limited knowledge of the hearing impaired makes their health care more complicated due to their communication problems.
DentiSign sign language is specifically designed for dentistry, with the most common issues/requests implemented in simple to learn, use and see signs. They do not borrow from ADSL or similar hand signals, rather are aligned for simplicity of use when reclined in the dental chair.
Dental sign language can help in restoring trust in a dentist-patient relationship. In a recent study,
Dental anxiety can prevent patients from cooperating totally during dental treatment. Dentists need to understand the anxiety and its repercussions in dental care so that a relationship of trust may be established with the patient for the implementation of strategies aimed at reducing the anxiety caused by dental treatment.
Anxiety reducing strategies are further compromised in hearing impaired children/adults because of their problem in communicating with others, and limited knowledge of the hearing impaired makes their health care more complicated due to their communication problems.
DentiSign sign language is specifically designed for dentistry, with the most common issues/requests implemented in simple to learn, use and see signs. They do not borrow from ADSL or similar hand signals, rather are aligned for simplicity of use when reclined in the dental chair.
Dental sign language can help in restoring trust in a dentist-patient relationship. In a recent study,
- fear of the unknown was eliminated by explaining the procedure to children using the dental sign language,
- proving a statistically significant difference in systolic and diastolic blood pressure before the initiation of treatment, with higher values in the study group.
- Once the treatment was initiated there was a marked reduction in the blood pressure values in the study group, which was statistically significant.
- Major issues raised by respondents were lack of deaf awareness, lack of specific calling systems,
- need to learn and to use basic sign language,
- using explanatory videos/books,
- dentist not pulling the mask down to speak to,
- not facing child to communicate,
- and lack of positive attitude of dentist in handling hearing impaired children.
- In the study, most of the issues raised by the hearing-impaired children respondents were overcome by utilizing the dental sign language.
- Children were able to express their thoughts and feelings with the dentist during the procedure using the signs such as stop, suction, pain and so on.
- This shows that an element of control and also means of communication were provided for the hearing impaired children which may explain the reason for decreased anxiety in the study group.
- Children were able to learn dental sign language within 20 minutes and used learned signs effectively during dental treatment which proves that the dental sign language was easy to learn, remember and implement.
