Current through Register Vol. 54, No. 44, November 2, 2024
Section 33.344 - Requirement of anesthesia permit for nonparenteral premedication of dental patients-statement of policy(a)Background. Section 11.2 of the act (63 P. S. § 130c) directs the Board to establish minimal training and education for the issuance of permits to dentists to administer general anesthesia, conscious sedation and analgesia on an outpatient basis. Definitions of these three terms appear in section 2 of the act (63 P. S. § 121). The definition of conscious sedation as "a minimally depressed level of consciousness . . . produced by a pharmacologic or nonpharmacologic method, or combination thereof" has raised the question of whether nonparenteral premedication of patients constitutes conscious sedation and thus triggers the permit requirement.(b)Purpose. The Board regards section 11.2 of the act as expressing the legislative purpose of reducing the risk of death or injury to dental patients who receive anesthetic modalities on an outpatient basis. In view of that purpose, and of the encompassing definition of conscious sedation adopted by the legislature, the Board believes that the protection afforded by the act extends to patients who, owing to a depressed level of consciousness produced by premedication, are at greater risk during the dental procedure and the recovery period thereafter. The Board believes further that such an increase in patient risk as a result of premedication requires the dentist to have training in preventing, recognizing and managing complications and emergencies associated with conscious sedation. It is this training which the conscious sedation permit requirement is designed to ensure.(c)Implementation. The Board recognizes that many variables-such as dosage, time of administration and the patient's physical and medical condition-bear on the effects of premedication during and after the dental procedure and that judgments as to these effects are the professional responsibility of the dentist. It is for the dentist therefore to determine whether premedication produces conscious sedation creating an increased risk of harm to the patient. If so, the dentist shall possess a restricted permit I or an unrestricted permit. In disciplinary proceedings brought against a dentist who has premedicated a patient without a permit, the Board will consider whether the average dentist in this Commonwealth, acting reasonably under the same circumstances, would have concluded, based on this section, the act and this chapter, that a permit was required.(d)Guidelines. The Board cannot provide absolute directives as to when a dentist is required to possess a permit before premedicating patients. The Board offers, however, the following guidelines concerning patients who, in its judgment, are most and least likely to require the protection afforded by the permit requirement: (1) The Board regards pediatric patients, geriatric patients, patients with handicapping conditions and patients who are medically compromised as principal candidates for nonparenteral premedication as well as the groups most at risk from this modality. Dentists who premedicate patients from these groups are advised to consider most carefully whether the permit requirement applies.(2) The Board regards persons not in the groups enumerated in paragraph (1), for whom nonparenteral premedications are used solely to reduce mild situational anxiety, or for whom analgesics are prescribed preoperatively to relieve dentally related pain, as generally incurring no increased risk of injury. In the absence of obvious risk, premedication of these patients is not considered conscious sedation for purposes of the permit requirement.The provisions of this §33.344 adopted December 8, 1989, effective 12/9/1989, 19 Pa.B. 5223.