Oral sedation dentistry Oral sedation dentistry Oral sedation dentistry is a medical procedure involving the administration of oral sedative drugs, generally to facilitate a dental procedure and reduce patients fear and anxiety related to the experience. Oral sedation is one of the available methods of conscious sedation dentistry, along with inhalation sedation (nitrous oxide) and conscious intravenous sedation. Drugs which can be used for sedation include diazepam, triazolam, zaleplon, lorazepam, and hydroxyzine. Dental patients with generalized anxiety, belonephobia (fear of needles and sharp instruments), prior dental trauma, or generalized fear of the dentist can take oral medication in order to reduce their anxieties.
Culture of fear that perceptions of risk, ideas about safety and controversies over health, the environment and technology have little to do with science or empirical evidence. Rather, they are shaped by cultural assumptions about human vulnerability. Furedi say that "we need a grown-up discussion about our post-September 11 world, based on a reasoned evaluation of all the available evidence rather than on irrational fears for the future. British academics Gabe Mythen and Sandra Walklate argue that following terrorist attacks in New York, the Pentagon, Madrid, and London, government agencies developed a discourse of "new terrorism" in a cultural climate of fear and