TEAM 1500 encourages all dentists to use their contacts and affiliations to help lobby against the ADA's ill-advised proposals. Please remember, however, that we ALSO need you to copy us on all your correspondence so that we can present themen masse to the ADA. There is power in numbers.

Emmett M. Jones, DDS, based in Jacksonville, NC, recently sent a letter to all his state ADA representatives urging them to vote against the ADA's proposals. Dr. Jones, a member of the Crown Council and the Dental Organization for Conscious Sedation, wrote:

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I am writing you to encourage a vote against the latest proposal changes before the ADA House of Delegates regarding recommendations in training and monitoring requirements for light and moderate oral conscious sedation.

State Boards have already created adequate requirements which have proven themselves safe tens of thousands of times allowing patients with severe fear to receive the treatment they need in a way that is safe, affordable, and effective. The new proposals would automatically change state guidelines due to it’s referencing of the ADA guidelines established 4 years ago.  These changes would effectively eliminate access to care for these high fear patients due to the inability for dentists to obtain the new proposal training requirements. It would take decades for the dentist’s that currently practice oral conscious sedation to be trained to the I.V. standard as proposed (due to a lack of such programs training availability).

 
This would effectively leave our patients with no option other then I.V. sedation thus increasing the expense and decreasing access to available trained dentists.

 

I have personally performed over 3,000 oral sedation appointments for “High Fear Patients” and have never had a patient sedated beyond a light to moderate level. Over 1 million patients have been treated nationally with these same oral sedation techniques with no mortality or morbidity. Our current training requirements are adequate and provide a proven degree of safety, better than that of the deep sedation provided by I.V. permitted practioners.

 

Once again I urge you to vote against this proposal.

 

Thank you for your time and efforts as our ADA delegates.

 

Sincerely,