Dental treatment for patients with physical or mental disability under general anesthesia at Tokyo Dental College Suidobashi Hospital.

Dental treatment for patients with physical or mental disability is often performed under general anesthesia due to level of cooperation with treatment, type and location of treatment, time required, or number of times patient is required to attend hospital. University hospitals are receiving an increasing number of requests from local private dentists and dental clinics to provide dental care for patients with physical or mental disability which can only be performed under general anesthesia. We carried out a retrospective survey of the routes of referral and types of dental treatment carried out in such patients under general anesthesia at Tokyo Dental College Suidobashi Hospital. The survey covered a 5-year, 9-month period from April 2006 to December 2011, during which 163 patients, comprising 106 men and 57 women, were treated. Their age ranged widely, from 2 to 53 years, with a high proportion (118 patients, 72.4%) being minors aged under 20. Among the total number of patients, 69 (42.3%) had disorders associated with mental retardation. One hundred and two patients (62.6%) had been referred from other medical institutions, with a particularly high number coming from public dental clinics for patients specializing in such patients. Conservative restorative procedures were performed in most cases (59.4%), with composite resin restorations being particularly frequent. After treatment, many patients returned to their referring medical institutions, which were responsible for subsequent management, but information on the posttreatment status was not available for some patients. Tokyo Dental College Suidobashi Hospital frequently collaborates with local medical institutions, and the present results suggest the importance of improving such collaboration.