You have never been able to explain why, but the thought of a surgical masked man working in your mouth with rubber gloves just gives you the creeps. When you imagine dentists, you see in your mind Orin, the sadistic dentist from "Little Shop of Horrors."

In fact, partly because of this fear, you are facing an absolute need to go to the dentist now, possibly because of a need for a root canal, or have a horrific toothache. But what are you to do? The whole experience could turn out to be an unpleasant activity, and you can feel your blood pressure rising just thinking about it.

Well, there is good news out there for you. Dentists have begun offering a new method of helping patients handle their anxiety. Anxiety is difficult problem for some patients. Many people are so terrified of going to the dentist that they miss their appointments for years, and their dental hygiene suffers greatly for it.

Dentists have a hard time with it as well. If a patient comes to the dentist and their teeth are in terrible shape, it makes his job of saving their mouth significantly tougher. What is even a bigger problem is that the person in question might not be cooperative and calm while he is trying to work, and working in an anxious patient's mouth is a hectic experience for both involved.

However, many dentists have begun to offer an additional option for the anxious patient. It's a fairly simple process. First, you need to get clearance from your family doctor. If he gives the okay for you to go under sedation, the doctor will give the information needed to the dentist you are going to see. Then, the dentist will give you a pill. The pill is a sedative, to calm you down significantly, and put you in to a very drowsy, sleepy state.

Of course, you will need a friend or family member to give you a ride to and from the dentist's office. You take the pill one hour before the appointment is scheduled to begin. By the time you arrive at the dentist's office, you will be very, very drowsy indeed. You will probably be awake for the procedure scheduled for you, but you will probably not remember much of what happens, thanks to the dreamlike state you find yourself in.

This has additional benefits besides keeping you from becoming anxious while the dentist is working on you. With a patient at full relaxation, it becomes possible for the dentist to do more than one procedure, and some very in-depth work in much less time than it would normally take for those procedures. And then, once it is all over, you will be on your way back home again, to relax and feel great relief, that your trip to the dreaded dentist is over, and it was not a problem at all.