Association of Anxiety in Patients Visiting Dental Institution

Aim: (1) To compare the association of anxiety in patients with different age groups, different education qualifications, and income. (2) To assess the frequency of anxiety in dental patients visiting dental institution for the first time. Materials and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among 366 patients who were seeking dental treatment for the first time in a dental institution. The Modified Dental Anxiety Scale was used to assess dental anxiety levels in patients visiting dental institution. Descriptive analysis and one-way ANOVA analysis were carried out using IBM SPSS Statistics, version 21.0. Results: The total prevalence of dental anxiety in patients visiting dental institution for the first time was 28.7%. Results showed that anxiety levels were more in 25–35 years of age (3.32) than in 46–50 years of age (2.08). Patients with low education (3.31) showed higher anxiety levels than patients with higher education (2.06), and low-income patients (3.41) showed more anxiety than patients with higher income (1.98). It was observed that the local anesthetic injection was the most anxiety-provoking item in the overall sample with a mean score of 3.69. Conclusion: The findings of the current study concluded that there is a prevalence of anxiety in dental patients visiting for the first time. Efforts should be made by dentists using customized psychological and pharmacological interventions to reduce anxiety and enhance patient compliance toward treatment.