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dentistry

Dentistry

TreeHouse School provides a dentistry service to help establish patterns of dental care for our autistic pupils. This is achieved by helping pupils feel comfortable when attending the dentist’s surgery.

Conventional dental treatment in the dental chair involving injections and drills would be very difficult for many TreeHouse School pupils for a number of reasons, such as limited understanding of dental treatment scenarios; difficulty interacting with unfamiliar adults and possible past negative experiences relating to dental visits. It is important these pupils and their families can avoid the trauma of dental treatment under general anaesthesia.

In order to make each dental experience as positive and productive as possible, the dentist will use information relating to (amongst other things) reinforcerment, communication (eg. verbal; PECS; Communication Book; Makaton; etc.), learning style, and diet with the help of staff members familiar with each child and their specific needs.

 

Practical points

All parents of pupils who have problems attending their own dentist or do not actually have a dentist and have requested assistance for their child will be offered appointments at TreeHouse School to work towards developing dental readiness. The timing of such appointments will be based upon the degree of dental readiness displayed by the child across time.

The service at TreeHouse School is for all pupils who have problems with tooth brushing and also attending the dental setting. Involvement with key staff members familiar with each child is essential to guide pupils through the dentistry experience and the dentist will also advise accordingly. Each child is accompanied by staff members familiar to them.

Finding out about each pupil is essential at this first appointment and a parent or guardian must be present. At this first visit the dentist will look at the child’s medical history, personal history, diet, home tooth brushing experience and use of fluoride.

Latest news

Read the latest about our work, and read personal stories, by our pupils or relatives and staff.

Useful links

Autism and Pediatric Dentistry by Dr Wendy Bellis. In this article Dr Wendy Bellis, specialist paediatric senior dental officer from Camden and Islington (Whittington Health) discusses some of the problems faced by the parents of an autistic child in relation to oral health and dental care. This article looks at these issues, many of which are unique to autism, and offers some possible solutions. 

The British Society of Paediatric Dentistry (BSPD), the organisation of dentists who care for children’s teeth, has assembled some advice for parents of children with autism. This includes an advice leaflet for parents