Preoperative analgesia for children and adolescents to reduce pain associated with dental treatment.

Data sourcesCochrane Oral Health Group's Trials Register, the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (CENTRAL), Medline, Embase, LILACS, ISI Web of Science, ClinicalTrials.gov and the WHO International Clinical Trials Registry Platform.Study selectionRandomised controlled clinical trials of analgesics given before dental treatment versus placebo or no analgesics in children and adolescents up to 17 years of age. Children and adolescents having dental treatment under sedation (including nitrous oxide/oxygen) or general anaesthesia were excluded.Data extraction and synthesisTwo reviewers independently selected studies, abstracted data and assessed risk of bias. Standard Cochrane methodological approaches were used.ResultsFive trials involving 190 patients were included. None of the studies were at low risk of bias. Three trials involved dental treatment and two involved orthodontic treatment. Three of the included trials compared paracetamol with placebo. Meta-analysis of the two trials showed no evidence of a benefit in taking paracetamol preoperatively; (RR) for postoperative pain of 0.81 (95%CI; 0.53 to 1.22). Four trials compared ibuprofen with placebo. Pooled data from two studies showed a statistically significant mean difference in severity of postoperative pain of -13.44 (95%CI; -23.01 to -3.88) on a visual analogue scale (0 to 100), which indicated a probable benefit. Both trials were at high risk of bias and the quality of the evidence is low.ConclusionsFrom the available evidence, we cannot determine whether or not preoperative analgesics are of benefit in paediatric dentistry for procedures under local anaesthetic. There is probably a benefit in using preoperative analgesics prior to orthodontic separator placement. The quality of the evidence is low. Further randomised clinical trials should be completed with appropriate sample sizes and well defined outcome measures.