5 Tips for Overcoming Dental Fear

Some people continuously postpone their dental treatments, mainly because they struggle with fear of the dentist.
They cannot stand the white robe of the dentist, the tools and machinery existent in the office, so they prefer not to visit the dentist at all.
Quite often however, it happens that a simple decay will transform into a very complex oral health problem, and then the patient needs to pay even more money in order to get proper treatment.
The following are a few useful tips that will help you fight off dentist phobia:
1. Dentist Phobia: At your own pace.
Make sure to ask the dentist to allow you to arrive for the dental exams whenever it is convenient to you, and to give you a little bit of “comfort zone” time right before starting the treatment. Those few extra minutes will help greatly reducing the fear and the panic you feel when entering the dental office.
2. Dental Phobia: A certain degree of control.
When your dentist is performing a treatment, and you start to feel somewhat uncomfortable, raise your hand in order for the dentist to stop for a while. Discuss with your dentist, and ask him to agree with this type of signaling. This will certainly help you feel more in control when you are sitting in that dentist chair.
3. Fear of Dentist: Tell your dentist everything.
If you have gone through a traumatic dental experience in the past, let him know. Dental offices are much better equipped with modern technology and truly efficient pain relievers and your dentist can help.
4. Dental Anxiety: Alternative dental treatments.
Hypnotherapy and sedation dentistry are two methods through which pain can be controlled extremely efficiently. Talk to your dentist about these options, and see if any of these can be applied in your case. Especially Hypnotherapy helps relieving dental anxiety and panic attacks.
5. Dental Phobia: Try to relax.
If your dentist is a friendly professional, talking to him right before the dental treatment starts, could make you extremely comfortable. Then if you believe that music can distract you a little bit, plug in your earphones during the dental treatment and let yourself carried away by the tunes a little.

Source: January 12th, 2012
Dental Health Magazine
Categories: Dentists

Is the idea of stress-free work environment an illusion?

By Huzefa Mohamed, Success Columnist
Over lunch the other day, I was discussing with my friend Pascal about work and stress. He suggested the two had become so inseparable these days that with work usually come bundles of stress.

Explaining, he said if you’re not stressed at work, the perception is that you’re probably not working hard or maybe you’re not working sincerely, or worse still, you’re not working at all – just passing away your time.

My professor used to say that stress could either be good or bad. At the workplace, good stress helps improve productivity and performance. On the other hand bad stress is counter-productive because it impedes our performance.

I am very disturbed to see that the bad stress is now accepted as part and parcel of work. In the last two decades, the number of people reporting negative effects of stress at work has gone up more than five times. But, since everyone “suffers” from it, no one seems to be doing anything about it.

You need to understand the link between stress and your health. Bad stress exposes you to all kinds of illnesses – from the less serious common cold to the more severe heart disease, high blood pressure, and strokes. It also leads to alcoholism, over-eating, drug addiction, smoking, depression, and other harmful behaviours.

In spite of these adverse outcomes of stress, most of us accept it as a price we must pay for survival and/or success. Is stress inevitable? Can’t we have a stress-free working environment? Can’t we enjoy our work, and experience no stress at all – good or bad? I believe you can.

De-linking your work from stress is vital for your health and happiness. According to my friend Pascal, it’s important that you spend your days doing something that you feel challenged to do, and appreciated. Without these and other key factors, you can be at risk for burnout.

The writer is a training consultant and author of ‘Winning the Battle’.
The Citizen

Stress may cause brain to shrink

If you’re stressed out from a divorce, a hard day at work or a fight with your girlfriend it might be causing your brain to shrink.
A study by Yale University researchers found that stressful life events can reduce gray matter in regions of the brain that regulate emotion and important physiological functions in healthy people to brain structure changes associated with psychiatric disorders, such as addiction depression and anxiety.
Past studies have only linked stress.
The effects of stress on the brains of healthy individuals hasn’t been clear.
The researchers looked at MRIs of more than 100 healthy people. They found the changes soon after stressful events occurred and said the findings may serve as warning signals of future psychiatric disorders and chronic diseases, such as diabetes or hypertension.
The study, which was published in the journal Biological Psychiatry, was funded by the National Institutes of Health.

By Andrea K. Walker / The Baltimore Sun

(c)2012 The Baltimore Sun Distributed by MCT Information Services

Demystifying Panic and Anxiety Attacks

The cause of panic and anxiety attacks relate to the functioning of the brain. More specifically, these attacks are caused by the Amygdala's reaction to anxiety provoking situations or thoughts. A person can be diagnosed with three types of panic attacks; namely, spontaneous panic attacks, specific panic attacks and situational predisposed panic attacks. A myth that has existed for many years surrounding panic and anxiety attacks is that it is a mental illness where in actuality, these attacks are frequently behavioral conditions with specific symptoms.

Persons suffering from panic and anxiety disorder may experience symptoms such as shaking, sweating, palpitations, shortness of breath, dizziness and hot flushes to name but a few. A common statement by panic attack sufferers is that they feel like they're dying or suffering a heart attack. Naturally, these symptoms may occur with many other ailments and are not necessarily related to panic and anxiety disorders, therefore treatment and diagnosis from a specialist is therefore of great importance should you be worried that you may be suffering from panic and anxiety disorders.

Panic and anxiety attacks are not necessarily both experienced at the same time. In other words, some people may suffer from anxiety attacks and never experience a panic disorder. When suffering from spontaneous panic attacks, they can strike at any time or in any situation. For example, these forms of panic attacks may occur while one is asleep or even during the day while at work. They are unpredictable and can cause a lot of stress for the person whom is experiencing the attack.

The second form of panic attacks, namely, specific panic attacks, are caused when a person is confronted with an anxiety provoking circumstance that he or she has experienced before or that relates to a previously anxiety experienced situation. Situational predisposed panic attacks relate to having a panic attack in a particular situation or in a particular place, for example, some people will only experience panic attacks while doing their weekly grocery shopping. This does not necessarily mean that they have a fear for the activity; it simply means that they are predisposed to experience panic attacks in that particular location.

Persons who suffer from panic and anxiety attacks tend to suffer from fatigue and may experience aches and pains in various muscles of their body. When a person suffers from anxiety, the most common places for muscle pain are in the areas of the neck, shoulders and chest area. When a person's muscles ache, it leads to tension within the given area. For example, a person suffering muscle tension in the chest area may experience shortness of breath, persons experiencing tension in the shoulder and neck area may experience migraines and headaches through the restrictions caused by the blood vessels.

Therefore, before treating the symptom it is important to know the source, what is causing the specific ache and pain. Various treatments for anxiety and panic attacks are available; they range from natural home remedies to prescribed medication. The advantage of these attacks is that they can be treated and cured permanently.

Suffering From Panic Attacks? Does Your Family Suffer Too? It Could Be Hereditary

There are many people who are ashamed of the fact that they suffer panic attacks or anxiety attacks. For this reason they hide away the fact that they suffer these attacks from others, often from their own family. This is a pity as many people find that when they start to talk about their anxiety attacks with members of their immediate family they find that their panic attacks are not just confined to themselves.

Often it seems that anxiety disorders and panic attacks can run in the family, in other words it seems that they can be genetic. It is not unusual for a person seeking help from these attacks to find that their own parent suffers from a very similar condition.

And when someone in the family becomes aware that a family member suffers from some form of anxiety attack or disorder and is having treatment for it they often come forward themselves, despite the fact that no one in the family realised that this was the case.

It is very difficult to study these things as there is usually a stigma associated with panic or anxiety attacks, and they are often not talked about.

It can often be the case that anxiety disorders are inherent in your family and you are not aware of it in either your family or yourself. This may be because you have not experienced an attack yourself. This does not however, mean that you wont. Panic attacks can be brought on unexpectedly by stressful events such as the death of a loved one, severe financial stress like loss of a job, or the burden of sever debt.

Unexpected traumas can bring on panic and anxiety disorders. Traumas such as a car accident, being the victim of a crime, or a major life threatening illness.

It is even possible to find one the victim of unexpected anxiety disorders from happy but stressful events such as getting married, starting a new job or having a family.

For many, when looking back, it is possible to pinpoint a major life event or life stress which started the panic attacks or anxiety attacks when there were none present before that event.

And for others it can be a long slow build up of stress over a longer time that can cause the onset of anxiety problems.

So there can be a wide range of causes of anxiety and panic problems. They can be hereditary, but not necessarily. They can be experienced form an early age though out life, or can suddenly come on from an unexpected life stressor. Alternatively they can result from the slow buildup of life stresses to the point where something seems to break and the anxiety seems to manifest itself.

And these are just some of the causes.

But the good news is that although anxiety and panic attacks can be extremely frightening and intimidating, they are often quite susceptible to treatment. There is no need to suffer in silence.