What inmuRELAX does to help

By producing gentle vibrations and calming music, inmuRELAX can help soothe dental anxiety. It creates a calming atmosphere, and gives the patient something else to focus on.

Anxieties are never rational, and it is often the smallest things that can be the greatest source of anxiety, such as the sound of the drill, the sight of a needle lying on a tray or the smell of the dental clinic. Even just hearing the dentist talk using technical terms to describe one’s teeth during an examination can seem frightening.

It’s the anticipation of pain and of discomfort that is unnerving, the fear of the unknown—not necessarily the examination or treatment itself. Lying in the dentist chair can make you feel like you are powerless, and the feeling of not being in control can be a major trigger for anxiety.

inmuRELAX can help give the patient some of that feeling of control back by providing a comfortable distraction. Once in a while the patient has to interact with inmuRELAX by pressing or stroking it in order to keep the vibrations and the music playing. That gives the patient an easy task to focus on. inmuRELAX has a soft cover, and details such as the golden wave that runs around it, which can keep the fingers distracted.

The gentle vibrations help you calm down, and this makes it easier for the patient to drift away.

For dentists and dental hygienists, using inmuRELAX can make their work easier, because they don’t need to spend as much time talking to the patient to keep the patient distracted.

With inmuRELAX you not only have a beautiful soft cushion to hold and keep your hands busy, but you also have the relaxing and calming music and soft vibrations. With your hand in the pocket you feel safe and can more easily get away into your own world while the dentist is doing his or her job.

“Good planning is everything”

Dental hygienist Nina Rune has twelve years’ experience giving dental treatments to kids and teenagers with dental anxiety.

“The most important thing when working with people with dental anxiety, is to take everything one step at a time. To remain calm and not stray from what you’ve planned beforehand. Good planning is everything,” Nina Rune explains.

Nina uses the inmu to calm and to distract her patients while she examines them.

“They feel like they can relax”

“At the clinic we specialise in treating kids and teenagers with dental anxiety. Basically, we have collected the patients here that have anxieties or special needs—diagnosed and undiagnosed. They come here, and they feel like they can relax.”

“One of my patients is a 17-year-old boy. When he comes to the clinic, he’ll stand around for a bit in the waiting room. He just has to get used to the situation and go through the procedures with us before we begin. He’ll tell me that he’s ready, and we can begin the treatment.”

Going through the individual steps of the treatment and making the patient comfortable with the procedure and the instruments used during the treatment is important in making the patient as comfortable as possible before the treatment begins.

In some cases, she and her colleagues will even let a patient come in at a time when there is no one else in the clinic.

“It can feel embarrassing to be afraid to go to the dentist”

“For some of the boys it can feel embarrassing to be afraid to go to the dentist, and they don’t want their friends to know that they feel nervous about coming here.” 

She also visits people’s own homes. For many people with dental anxiety simply being in the dental clinic can feel frightening.

“Sometimes we’ll do home visits too before patients come to the clinic, to reassure them about what is going to happen during the procedure.”

“Everything gets easier when you are calm”

And often Nina Rune will start out slow. First by simply having the patient lie down in the dentist chair. Then by making a simple, non-invasive examination of the patient’s teeth. Slowly, and by taking everything one step at a time, she makes the patient accustomed to the situation and the environment, and when he or she feels like they are ready to move on to the next step, Nina will continue the treatment.

Often even simple procedures can be triggering for someone with dental anxiety.

“The last time he was here, we were making a mould for a nightguard for him, because he has been grinding his teeth. That’s something he has never tried before. And he wasn’t too happy about it. He had been worried about the procedure for several days when he came here.”

“I told him about the inmuRELAX, and told him that I thought it would help him. And it really did. It helped him calm down, and everything gets easier when you are calm. He was very excited about using the inmuRELAX. It made a huge difference. The inmuRELAX really saved him.”

“The inmu really saved him”

Through using inmuRELAX she has found that the inmuRELAX can help calm and provide a distraction during the procedure.

“I’ll give them the inmuRELAX when they are lying in the chair. Then I’ll use a disinfectant wipe to clean their hands. I’ll put the inmuRELAX on their stomach and guide their hand into the pocket.”

Instead of focusing on the look of the dentist’s instruments and on what is going on inside their mouth, they can instead focus their attention on the inmuRELAX; on the soft material, on the music, and on the gentle vibrations that it produces.

Dentist Mariane Sørensen uses the inmu to make going to the dentist a better and calmer experience for people with special needs.

She and her colleague, dental hygienist Jeanette Tøttrup, have been using the inmu for three months, after Randers Public Dental Care
bought three inmus to use in their clinic in Randers.

“I can hear that my voice changes when I use the inmu. It gets lower, because it has this calming effect,” Mariane says.

“When I use the inmu on a new patient, I sit them down in the chair, and tell them that we’ve got a new tool that I want them to try out.”

They both work at a section of the clinic that specialises in helping people with special needs. The response they have received from their patients has been very positive. Especially because of its calming effect.

Easier treatment

The more time Mariane can spend focusing on the treatment and on the patient’s mouth, the quicker and easier it is for her to finish the treatment. This is especially important when treating people with special needs.

“The inmu gives me more time to work on a patient with their mouth open. Because it can help the patient feel calmer and more relaxed when lying in the chair, it makes it easier for me to treat them.”

The responses that she has received from her patients have been very positive.

Robust tool

Working with patients who have special needs can prove challenging, since no patient is the same as another, and everyone needs specialised treatment. This extends to every part of the treatment, from the dental care to the social approaches and the tools used. Effective treatment is individual, and while an approach might work well on one patient, it might not work on another.

“The people that I treat are not always able to say what they like and what they don’t like. Sometimes their way of saying no to something that annoys them is to push it away. And the inmu has also once in a while been kicked or thrown on the floor when I’ve used it. But that hasn’t done anything to damage it. It’s proven quite resilient,” Mariane says.

“I’ve used inmuRELAX on nearly all my patients, and their responses have been overwhelmingly positive. There hasn’t been anyone who has refused to use it. Quite the opposite! At the moment, a clinic in the area has borrowed inmuRELAX from us, and several of the kids have asked for it, because they want to have it with them when they are lying in the dentist chair.”

“I can see that the kids relax when they use inmuRELAX”
Nina Rune works as a dental hygienist at the school-based dental clinic Tandplejen Skolebakken, which is attached to the elementary school Kattegatskolen in the Danish city of Grenaa. The clinic serves some 1,200 children under the age of 18, many of whom suffer from dental anxiety.

Using inmuRELAX has been an exceedingly positive experience for her.
“I can see that the kids relax when they use inmuRELAX. I was seeing three boys from first grade, and they were full of energy, and kidding around and acting cool, but as soon as I gave them inmuRELAX and put it on their stomach, they relaxed completely.”

Nina Rune has worked at the clinic for twelve years. As a dental hygienist at an elementary school, one of her main tasks is to give the kids a good experience when going to the dentist. Scary stories and bad experiences at an young age are the main culprits in people developing dental anxieties later in life.

“inmuRELAX made him lie completely still”
“It changes the kids’ focus from the treatment to something else. And it calms. Sometimes when I tilt the chair back up again, I’ll hear them yawn. So, I know that they’ve been comfortable and relaxed.”

By giving the kids something else to focus on, inmuRELAX provides a welcome distraction from the alien feeling of having someone use an instrument inside their mouth and having their mouth open for a prolonged amount of time. 

“One day I was seeing a small boy from first class, who had a loose tooth. It took three minutes for the topical anaesthetic to start working. That’s a long time to wait when you are at that age. Usually I would fill the time by talking. But with inmuRELAX that hasn’t been necessary. It made him lie completely still while he was just feeling the vibrations and listening to the music.”

“Her patience was short, but the inmu made it longer”
Using inmuRELAX makes Nina Rune’s own work easier, as she does not need to worry about keeping the kids entertained during the breaks where they have to lie with mouth open.

“Everything just feels calmer. And the small breaks we have during treatment, we don’t have to fill them with idle chatter anymore. It makes the time pass quicker.”

She has also found that inmuRELAX can be a helpful aid in making energetic kids stay still during treatment.

“We get several refugee families here. And they have absolutely no idea what is going to happen. A lot of them are not used to going to the dentist, and some have never tried being examined before.”

“I was seeing a five-year-old Syrian girl. Normally the children are nervous when they come here, and we have to find ways to calm them down. But this girl was just full of energy, and she couldn’t stay calm. She wanted to touch everything. Getting to hold inmuRELAX made her calm down, and made her lie still during the entire procedure. Her patience was short, but the inmu made it longer.”