Comparative evaluation of pain perception during conventional greater palatine injections versus the use of a novel barovibrotactile device - In vivo study.

Background: Pain control by means of local anesthesia is an intrinsic part of clinical practice in dentistry. It is an irony that the modality used for pain free procedure itself is a source of fear & anxiety to the patient. Several modifications have been made to the injecting devices, local anesthetic solutions and techniques to render their administration comfortably. The objective of this study was thus designed to evaluate and compare anxiety and pain perception during conventional greater palatine injections versus use of a novel barovibrotactile device named Accupal to give painless anesthesia. This device has an additional attachment which works on Vibra-pulse technology thus minimizing pain during injection technique. Materials and methods: A prospective, split mouth, open label, randomized, crossover clinical study was conducted on 50 patients coming to our institute whereby on one side Accupal was used during administration of local anesthesia. And on other side, traditional local anesthetic injection technique was used with one week of time interval. Results: A statistically significant difference was found as in the pain perception between the two techniques as per Visual Analogue Scale whereas no difference was seen in the anxiety levels as per the physiological parameters recorded by noninvasive blood pressure machine at various intervals. Conclusion: The use of Accupal has thus proved to show better pain control as compared to traditional injection techniques of local anesthesia.