Urgent Care Dental Patient Knowledge about Opioids and Other Analgesics

Objectives: Dental patients reporting for urgent care often are in pain; procedure-related pain also can result from the emergent care they receive. The literature is void, however, of any research on patient perceptions of opioid pain medications in the dental setting for management of acute dental pain. Moreover, patient knowledge of medications to alleviate dental pain is unknown. It was predicted that patients would have less knowledge about opioid medications than over-the-counter (OTC) medications.

Methods: Participants included 108 adult outpatients (M age=39.3, SD=15.0; 55.6% female) who reported to the West Virginia University School of Dentistry urgent care clinic. They completed a battery of standardized verbal-report instruments assessing current dental pain, as well as knowledge and expectations about five opioid and five OTC analgesics.

Results: Fewer patients reported sufficient knowledge to evaluate perceived efficacy of the opioid medications (36.1%) versus the OTC medications/combinations (70.4%) commonly used in treatment, χ²(1)=21.45, p<.0005. A majority of patients (66.6%) believed they would need a prescription medication, versus an OTC medication (33.3%), for relief to address the dental pain currently being experienced, χ²(1)=11.45, p<.001.

Conclusions: These results reveal that a significant proportion of dental patients have quite limited knowledge about analgesic medications that can be used to alleviate dental and other pain. This lack of knowledge is a vulnerability, in that patients may be unaware of the power of OTC medications, and the risk of addiction for opioids. Additionally, two-thirds of patients expected to receive a prescription medication as a result of their dental appointment. Future research could explore the inclusion of analgesic knowledge as a component of oral health literacy.